Lily Evans and the Marauder's Match
by mountainwords
Summary: Dumbledore's eyes were so kind that it hurt to look into them-Lily was sure he would see the lie she'd told James, would see the guilt that had consumed her for the past few months. He smiled. "What can we trust, if not love? I made you Head Boy and Girl for a reason, you know." - A retelling of how Lily and James fell in love Seventh Year.
1. Unsettling News

**A/N: Welcome to my story! It's meant to be written as closely to JK Rowling's style as I can manage, and I would love feedback on how I'm doing. Similarly, the story's plot is structured similarly to a Harry Potter book. Of course, I am not nearly as good a writer as good ol' JK, but it can't hurt to try. Currently I have a few different chapters finished, so updates should be quick. Happy reading!**

**Disclaimer: I am not JK Rowling, nor do I own any of her characters or settings.**

Lily Evans awoke with a start. She quieted her breathing, which was loud in the dark room, and listened. She could hear the whirr of her window air conditioner, the thrum of the fridge downstairs, and the soft tick-tock of the clock on her bedside table. Otherwise, everything was quiet. She let out a long breath.

Nothing unusual. It must've just been a weird dream-she closed her eyes, and her subconscious stirred up an image of a black haired baby. Weird. Nonetheless, she was fully awake now.

She flicked on the light, and sat up. Her room had the air of being only partially lived in-there were wide gaps in her book shelf where books had been removed, and pale spots on the walls marked where her parents had pulled down her Muggle posters and put up framed pictures of things like sail boats and flowers. She didn't mind the empty feeling.

Somehow, ever since she had received the letter declaring that she was a witch six years before, 14 Appleblossom Lane hadn't quite felt like home. When her parents had owled asking whether she would mind if her father used her childhood room as his study, it was only with a small twinge of regret that she had agreed.

Lily climbed out of bed, smoothed out her patched quilt, and crossed to the desk. A charms book was open on it, and a young man with a bubble over his head watched her from the page. She flicked through the book, then closed it and set it down. At that moment reading more Charms didn't appeal to her.

Instead she picked up the letter her best friend, Alice, had sent her. "_Lily_," she had wrote in cramped handwriting, "_Good to hear you passed your Apparition test-now we can visit each other so easily! Frank still hasn't passed his, and it's been a right pain arranging visits. It's funny-he's so good at all other types of magic, I'm not sure why Apparition has caused such a block. His mother has given him a very hard time about it, and I think maybe that's contributed a bit. She's a tough lady, but in times like these, I'll be glad to have her as a mother-in-law. No, no, don't worry we aren't quite at that point yet. But you know how it is. After four years it's hard not to talk about getting married with some degree of certainty. Anyway, let me know if you need a break from Petunia before the summer is up. Or, better yet, let me know if you'd like to meet up in Diagon Alley to pick up our last round of school supplies! Bonus points if you bring your dad. He's my favorite. Send Nyma back with your answer. Lots of love, Alice_."

Lily set down the letter and sank into the desk chair. Her day in Diagon Alley with her dad and Alice had already passed, and her new items-a pile of glossy books, new robes, and a kit of potion supplies-had been stored neatly in the wooden trunk at the foot of her bed. On top of the trunk, an extra set of robes and a shiny golden badge that read "HG" had been set carefully out.

Next she picked up a folded, much-read newspaper from her desk. The headline read, "A Dark Lord to Rival Grindelwald?" She immersed herself in the story, even though she had already read it several times. Somehow, she felt as though by memorizing the words that marched matter-of-factly across the page, she would be able to get a grasp on the dangers that surrounded the wizarding world.

Soon the sun peeked over her windowsill. Lily blinked a few times, and put down the newspaper. She had that foggy, weak feeling from waking up too early. The house had come to life around her-the bathroom groaned as someone turned on the shower, and downstairs she could hear her dad putting on a pot of tea. She refolded the newspaper and tucked it into a drawer in the desk, where the image of a smoky skull with a snake that slithered out of its mouth couldn't watch her.

She padded down the stairs in her slippers, and pulled up a chair at the kitchen table. The smell of baking chocolate chip cookies had flooded the downstairs. "Lily flower!" Her dad closed the oven and straightened up. He was a middle aged, greying man with Lily's bright green eyes. Before his hair had turned grey, it had been the same dark red as her own.

Lily privately thought that she had received most of her genetics from her dad. They had the same sense of humor, the same pet peeves. And while he may not have been magical, he certainly did have a unique way of looking at the world. The only thing she seemed to have inherited from her mum was the constant need for organization and control. Well, and her nose-which was lucky, as her dad had quite the beak.

"Cookies for breakfast again?" She grinned at him.

He shrugged, smiled. "Mum picked up more milk yesterday, so I figured, why not? What's more muggle than a nice tray of cookies to send you off with?"

"I don't leave until tomorrow," she reminded him, voice gentle. He wasn't great at dates.

Harry Evans was non-plussed. "Well, we can eat half of them now, and you can save the rest till tomorrow."

She grinned into the mug of tea he'd placed in front of her. "That solves that then."

She looked around at the kitchen, with its worn tiled counter tops and clutter of food that seemed to spill out of the drawers. Vases of freshly picked flowers decorated every flat, open space available-Lily's dad was a florist. It was disorganized, but in a warm, cozy way. She always missed it when she was at Hogwarts.

"Mum not up yet?"

"I let her sleep in. She only has a precious few days before she's got to go back to dealing with the spawn of our society."

Lily laughed. "It's a good thing she's the teacher."

"Yes ma'am it is, I'd rather prune a plum tree any day. So, is Severus riding with us to the train station tomorrow?"

"I think so. He could apparate-"

"No, no. It's tradition! Tell him he has no choice. And that we're leaving at-er-9 o' clock, or at least I think that's what your mum said..." He bent to peer through the oven door again. Lily tugged the Muggle news toward her, and began to read a story about an earthquake that had caused a dozen homes to crumble up in the mountains.

Her dad had just pulled the cookies out of the oven when her mum and older sister came trundling down the stairs, still clad in their pajamas. Petunia was tall and thin, with straight blond hair that she kept pulled up in a ballerina's bun (this had begun the day after a girl at school had told Tuney that her long neck made her look like a dancer).

"Cookies for breakfast?" Asked Lily's mum as she entered the kitchen. "Isn't it rather early?" She had a kindly, soft face, and Petunia's height. Her eyes looked more lined than usual this morning.

"Yes indeed, honey. Have to send Lily off properly."

Lily and her mom met eyes behind his back. Lily shrugged, and her mom smiled. Petunia pursed her lips as she poured out a mug of tea.

After a breakfast of tea, cookies, and scrambled eggs, Lily stood. "I'm going to head to the park. I should be back in a few hours."

"Going to meet your boyfriend?" Petunia sneered.

Behind her, Lily's mum, Rose Evans, turned to listen. The tea she had been pouring spilled over the brim of the mug and onto the counter. "Leave her alone, Petunia."

Lily simply raised her eyebrows in Petunia's direction. "See you later Mum, Dad."

It was shaping up to be a beautiful summer's day outside. As Lily walked, her thoughts drifted in and out of focus in the same familiar swirl that they'd followed the past six months. How could she keep her family safe? She wasn't important enough for them to become a target, but what if that changed? Or what if they fell prey to random Muggle-baiting? That article about the landslides had upset her-there had been rumors that Voldemort was recruiting giants. What if that was what had destroyed the Muggle's homes? So how do I keep them safe?

A little voice inside her whispered: "Don't get involved with the war."

But that was impossible. She had to-she had no choice. She was top in her class, and she had worked hard to make it so. She wasn't about to let that hard work go to waste. But what about her family?

The leaves of a grand oak tree above her rippled in the wind. She looked up at them, and took a deep breath. Enough.

The park was only a block away from her house. She walked along the little, winding path until it came to the swings. One swing was already occupied by a young man, with dark black hair and a sallow face. His oversized, black smock billowed in the wind as he rocked backward and forward.

The boy's black eyes found Lily and didn't leave her face as she neared. "Hey," he said, the casualness of his voice at odds with the intensity of his gaze.

"Hey Sev," she said. With a little hop, she pulled herself onto the swing next to his. His eyes followed the swirl of her dark red hair as the wind caught it.

"You look… unhappy." He smirked. "Sad to leave Petunia?"

Lily ignored the jibe. "Sad to leave my family. I can't stop thinking about that muggle family in Hanover that was murdered. I'm worried."

Snape's face softened. "They'll be okay, Lils. You're not important enough for anyone to want to target your family."

Lily smiled. "Safety in anonymity."

They swung in silence for awhile. Severus' hands clenched and unclenched on the swing chain, his knuckles striped white and red. His eyes cut to her every time she swung ahead of him.

"I can't believe it's our last year," Snape said finally. "Do you remember the first time we spoke? When I told you that you were a witch, and that you were going to Hogwarts?"

"It seemed too good to be true." Lily was smiling in earnest now. Snape seemed to light up under its warmth.

"It is too good to be true. I don't want it to end. I mean, I'm going to miss the food, and the library, and even good old Sluggy…"

Her laughter splashed into the air. "I can't decide if I'm going to miss Sluggy or the food most."

"Don't be silly, clearly you're going to miss the library most. I don't think there's been a bookworm as big as you in the past century."

Lily shook her head, grinning. She increased the speed of her swinging, until her toes rustled the long leaves of a nearby willow. She closed her eyes, and enjoyed the feeling of the humid summer air against her skin. When she opened them again, the swing had slowed to a gentle sway.

"Hey Sev, you are driving with us tomorrow right? My dad wanted to know."

"Of course." Severus had long since stopped his swing, and had watched Lily with unfathomably dark eyes. "What time?"

"Dad says 9, but maybe make it 8:45 just to be sure."

Snape smiled. "I'll never forget the time he thought the train got in an hour later than it actually did, and we missed it."

"I've never been so furious in my life. Well, maybe except for the time Potter charmed my potions essay to flap around my head and ask me out." _Or the time you called me a Mudblood_. The thought rose unbidden. She kept it inside. It was only in the last few months that they'd been able to mend their friendship after that incident. Despite all the anger, the hurt, she understood why he had done it. He'd been shamed, and he was desperately embarrassed that she'd witnessed it. It was too much that she'd tried to help him when he was unable to help himself, and he'd lashed out.

They were both silent, slightly uncomfortable. Lily got the sense that they were both remembering the fight that had ensued after, and how she'd stormed and raged. No, she had never been angrier than that. Finally, Snape shook his head—his lank black hair flopped into his eyes. "You should've just ended him then. That kid is no good."

It took Lily a moment to remember that they were talking about Potter. "He's annoying. But he's not as bad as some of the guys you hang out with. Mulciber, Avery." She frowned. It was a familiar argument between them, one that they could settle into without much thought.

This time, though, Snape surprised her. "I wouldn't be so sure," he said, voice dark. "Black's family is as dark as their name, and I can't see how he would've escaped that. I wouldn't be surprised if he's drawn James into that sort of thing. You don't know half of what goes on in their little circle outside of the Gryffindor common room."

Lily dragged her feet through the wood chips as she digested what Snape had said. "What did happen last year up at the Shrieking Shack, Sev?" She asked tentatively. It wasn't the first time she'd asked the question.

"You know I can't tell, Lils. Not even you. But I promise you that it's worse than anything anyone in my house has done. The Marauders make Mulciber and Avery look like saints."

What if they were as bad as Mulciber, as Avery? Was she really so biased as to believe that those sorted into Gryffindor couldn't get involved in the Dark Arts? And why not? They bullied people, and used their popularity as a mask to get away with it. They had their own name-The Marauders. Was that so different from the Death Eaters?

"What about Lupin?" she asked finally. "I can't see him getting involved with that sort of thing."

"I think it's closer to his nature than you would believe," Snape said. The way he said it, dark, secretive, made her half believe it.

Lily stood up from her swing. "I'll have to think over that some more. Ready to head home?"

He half bowed before her, and slid off of the swing. Lily laughed, and wrapped her arm around his as they headed down the path and out of the park. Next to the warmth of her hair, Snape didn't look quite so sallow.

They were immersed in a conversation about the latest potion Snape had been working on-a terribly tricky mixture called Felix Felicis that brought the drinker luck-when they arrived at her door.

"I swear, if you shred the lacewings instead of putting them in whole, you'll get a much better absorption rate," insisted Lily.

"I suppose I could do that…" he frowned, mulling it over. "Unless the reason they're whole is that the potion requires a slower absorption rate."

Lily rolled her eyes. "You always think you know best. When we get back to Hogwarts we can both try making it, and we'll see whose turns out."

"Sounds like a deal." They shook on it, and Severus turned away from her door. "See you tomorrow, Lils."

"See you, Sev." She watched him walk away down the street, expression troubled, before stepping inside. The house still smelled like freshly baked cookies.

Petunia was sitting in the living room, a bottle of open nail polish clutched in her hand. Something about the whiteness of her face, the tight way she was holding the nail polish, made Lily sit down next to her. "Want me to do the left hand?"

Her older sister smiled. "That'd be wonderful. No… no funny business though."

"I wouldn't dare." Lily dipped the brush in the pale pink paint, and expertly dabbed it onto her sister's nails. "Have a date with Vernon?"

"He's taking me out to Ricardo's. You know, that fancy Italian restaurant over by-"

"I grew up here too, you know," Lily reminded her. "I know where Ricardo's is. Fancy, for a regular dinner date."

Petunia's hollow cheeks pinkened. "Well, Lily-" for the first time Lily noticed that her fingers were trembling slightly. "I, um, well I'm glad you offered to paint my nails tonight. I have a feeling it might be a special night…"

Lily's grip tightened on her sister's hand. "Really?"

Petunia nodded shakily, and Lily felt warmth bloom inside of her. She loved her sister, and she knew that Tuney loved her. But they were very different, and ever since Lily had left for Hogwarts, their relationship had been strained at best. For Petunia to confide in her-to want to share this moment with her… Lily's eyes felt hot and itchy.

She swiped at them with the back of her hand, embarrassed. "That's wonderful, Tuney. Vernon makes you really happy." She squashed the piece of her that whispered that Vernon brought out the most close minded, small version of her sister, and forced it into a contained part of her. Right now was not the time to have those thoughts.

"Are you crying?" Petunia's gaze searched her face. "You are! Lily, you don't need to cry!" She sounded slightly horrified.

Her words made the tears come faster. Lily swept color onto Petunia's pinky nail and capped the bottle. She wiped her eyes with her sleeve. "I'm just glad you told me." She inhaled deeply, forced the tears to stopper themselves. "Are you going to tell mom and dad?"

"Not until later. We planned to tell them tomorrow at dinner, and you won't be here-" Petunia trailed off. The warmth inside of Lily cooled slightly.

She had missed a lot in Petunia's life-her graduations, her birthday parties, her first dates and first kisses-and she could feel how much that had cost their relationship. "Well, thank you for sharing this with me now, you don't know how much it means to me."

Petunia's smile gave a tremulous waver, and she squeezed Lily's hand. They sat for a moment, looking at the neat way the nail polish had settled on Tuney's nails. When it had dried, Petunia stood up. "Well, I suppose I had better start getting ready."

"Let me know if you need any help."

Petunia waved her away, and disappeared upstairs.

Lily's brain felt very full. Her sister almost engaged, the Marauders involved with the Dark Arts, Voldemort's rise to power… At times like these, it was too difficult to reconcile her normal, muggle life with everything happening in the magical world. She pulled a blanket over herself, closed her eyes, and spent the rest of her last day at home asleep on the couch.


	2. A Big-Headed Head Boy

**Disclaimer: I am not JK Rowling, and I own none of the Harry Potter universe!**

Their small sedan was very full the next morning. Petunia, Lily and Snape had been crammed into the back seat of the car, and Snape and Lily's trunks stuffed into the boot. Petunia was sporting a shiny diamond ring, and she had waved it at Lily with a very un-Petunia grin before hiding her hand in her pocket.

At the train station, chaos ruled. Petunia gave her an unusually warm squeeze outside of the barrier (she hated walking through it), and then leaned against a solid divider to wait until Lily's parents returned. Lily gave her a sad grin, and slipped back into her own world, reflecting that maybe her and Petunia had finally turned over a new leaf in their relationship. After shaking Lily's dad's hand, and giving Lily's mum a quick hug, Snape headed off to find some of his Slytherin friends. Lily lingered with her parents a bit longer. "I'll miss you," she told them. It was true. For some reason, this felt different than the six years prior. This felt like the beginning of the end.

"We always miss you," said her dad. "Even when you're with us!"

Lily laughed. Her father's attempts at humor were especially weak when he was sad. She wrapped her arms around him and squeezed him tight. He smelled like dirt and flowers. When they pulled apart, he handed her the tin of cookies he had brought.

Her mom's face was lined with sadness. Lily recognized the expression as her best attempt to withhold tears. "My least favorite day of the year," she murmured, pulling Lily in so that she could inhale her hair. "We love you Lils. Write as much as you can."

"I always do." They all gazed at each other for a long moment, smiling sadly. Lily could feel the back of her throat tightening. "Well, I had better dash. Give Tuney a last hug for me."

They waved, and she moved off through the crowd, towing her magically lightened trunk behind her. She climbed onto the train, and fought her way to the front, where she would lead the Prefect's meeting. Her Head Girl badge, pinned to the thick, brown sweater she had chosen to offset it, gleamed.

Up until this point, she had been too caught up in her life at home to wonder who had been selected as Head Boy. There were a few likely candidates, though she personally hoped that Remus Lupin had been selected. He was the kindest of the Marauders, regardless of what Snape had to say about him, and he and Lily had bonded over their prefect duties.

When she opened the compartment, Remus was already seated inside. His battered trunk had been stowed neatly under his seat. Lily was disappointed to see that while he wore a badge, it only had a "P" for Prefect on it. "Hullo Lily," he said, patting the seat beside him. "Head Girl, I see. No surprise there."

Lily smiled at him and sat down. "Thanks. How was your summer?"

Remus sighed, and Lily took her first good look at him. He looked tired, worn. Perhaps even more so than usual. "Long. I always miss Hogwarts."

"Me too, but then when I'm at Hogwarts I miss my family. I feel like it's this constant pull between the two…"

Remus smiled. "I suppose I'm lucky that way. My family is at Hogwarts."

The compartment door slid open, and a head of messy hair preceded the long, lanky form of James Potter. "Speak of the devil," said Lily. "This is a Prefect's meeting, Potter. Shoo."

Inexplicably, James turned to Remus instead of responding. "You didn't tell her?"

Remus held up his hands. "I er- I figured you would want to tell her."

"Tell me what?" asked Lily testily. She could feel her cheeks heat up, as they always did in Potter's presence. And then her eyes landed on the golden badge pinned to his burgundy sweater, and it all clicked together. HB. Head Boy. "Dumbledore made you Head Boy?!" It was impossible to keep the shock out of her voice.

James looked slightly stung, but he took a deep breath. "He did, difficult though it may be to believe."

Lily's mouth opened, as though it wanted to spout more words at him, but she forced it closed. When no angry tirade followed, James scanned the open seats in the compartment and sank into one that was a good distance away from hers.

"Well," said Remus after a silent spell. "That went more smoothly than I had expected."

Lily glared at him. "I'm perfectly capable of being mature."

"As am I," said Potter quickly, quietly. Lily tried not to look disbelieving, and instead found herself looking him over. He had grown over the summer, and the extra inches put him at almost a whole head taller than her. He also looked more serious, more adult, than she was used to. Unbidden, she found herself wondering what had happened to make him that way. Dark magic? Frustratingly, the look worked for him. She wondered if there was a positive correlation between being attractive and evil.

The train began to trundle forward, and the prefects, two from each house, began to trickle in. They took their seats and chatted eagerly. When everyone had arrived, Lily stood. They quieted, and focused their attention on her at once. Lily loved Prefects. They were her favorite type of Hogwarts student-bookish, mature, intelligent. She gave the speech she had prepared, about responsibility and teamwork and accountability, and earned herself a healthy dose of applause. Then she sat down, prepared to organize their schedules, but Potter stood up.

He held out a hand to her, as if to cut off any complaints, and the Prefects chuckled. It was no secret that James and Lily didn't get along. "I'd like a word too, before we get started." He looked around at them, hazel eyes bright behind his glasses, and when no one complained he took a deep breath. "Listen, the Sorting Hat said it better than I can last year, and I'm sure it will do a far more eloquent job again at the feast this year. But it said it for a reason, and I'm going to repeat it. We are all from different houses, and traditionally our houses have competed against each other. But this year especially, I can't stress how important it is that we function not as separate houses, but as one school, unified by our ability to do magic. You Prefects set an example for the rest of the school as to how we should behave toward one another, and things like docking points unfairly from other houses or letting people from your own house slide only serve to create tension. There are things a lot bigger, a lot worse out there than the differences between us, and if we can't band together in the face of them, we're all done for."

Lily listened to the rest of his speech with narrowed eyes. It was pretty. It was well thought out. And it was also the perfect way to make people believe he was on the right side of things.

When Potter had finished, the small compartment broke out in thunderous applause, and a fifth year Hufflepuff prefect slung his arm around Zabini, a sixth year Slytherin. Zabini fought to hide his disgust. Two new prefects-a curly haired girl from Hufflepuff, and a girl with long silvery hair from Ravenclaw-looked James over and then shared a meaningful glance. Lily felt fairly certain that they would have no problem overcoming house differences if it meant spending time with the Head Boy. The thought made her feel vaguely nauseous.

James let them clap for a long moment, and then raised hand. A hush fell over the group. "Let's get to schedules."

Lily watched him warily as he began to pencil in each Prefect's various obligations. Something had definitely changed. The Potter of last year would have hammed it up so that everyone kept clapping. He would've purposefully given the Slytherins the worst patrol schedules. She started when he met her eyes. "You okay?"

"Yeah, fine." Lily rubbed a hand over her face, and leaned in to join the conversation.

After all of their schedules had been sorted out, the Prefects dispersed to do their patrols. When the compartment door had slammed behind the pair of Hufflepuffs, Lily turned to James. "So now we make a strategy for the year-"

"Er, yeah, that's a good idea." He shuffled the schedules in his hands, and a paper escaped and seesawed its way to the floor. James snatched it up. His cheeks were slightly pink. "Okay," he said at last. "So strategy-" His cool of a few minutes before seemed to have left with the Prefects.

Lily frowned at him. "Yes, strategy. I liked what you said about interhouse relations. Maybe we could make that the theme of our year?"

Potter took a deep breath. "Yeah. That sounds like a really good idea. Yeah."

"Potter." Her voice came out sharper than she'd intended. "Are you okay?"

James' hand flew to his hair. He looked distinctly embarrassed. "Yeah, I'm fine. I guess I'm just not-" He glanced warily at her, but pressed on. "I'm not used to being alone in a room with you and not shouting at each other. It's throwing me off."

Lily couldn't help herself-she laughed. "Is that all? I can yell at you if that'd make it better."

He smiled sheepishly. "I guess I'd rather keep the shouting to a minimum."

"Deal. Okay, so the plan. I love the idea of interhouse relationships being the theme of this year. We could ban house sorted tables for the Halloween feast, and maybe have the prefects patrol with people from different houses…" As she talked, James slid lower in his seat, his long legs stretching out across the compartment floor. His hand disentangled itself from his hair.

"Do you think people would be willing to sit with different houses for the feast?" he asked. "Not to say it isn't a great idea-it's just most people don't have many friends outside their houses."

Lily frowned. "Good point. Maybe we'd take away the option. Sub in one huge table for the four smaller ones, or something. Or we could ask Dumbledore to bewitch the benches so that no two people from the same house can sit next to each other."

James' eyes lit up. "That would be brilliant! We could have the benches dump them on their bums if they tried. It's hilarious and requires inter-house bonding. Excellent."

Lily pursed her lips. "We'll have run it by Dumbledore, of course."

"Of course," agreed James sanctimoniously.

Once James had relaxed he had lots of ideas-Lily drew up a list, and they recorded the best ones to report to Dumbledore at their meeting that evening. They were in deep conversation about bridging the Gryffindor-Slytherin divide (a divide that James, much to Lily's suspicion, seemed serious about mending), when the food trolley rolled by.

"Is it that time already?" asked Lily in wonder. She stood up and stretched, ignoring the fact that James' eyes followed her. "Want anything?"

James handed her a few knuts. "A couple pumpkin pasties and some Bertie Botts, if you wouldn't mind."

Lily stuck her head out of the compartment and flagged down the food trolley witch. She traded the coins for an armload of snacks, and deposited them on the small table in the middle of the Prefect's compartment.

"Fan of sugar quills, then? Figures." He said, twirling one of the quills she'd just purchased.

"Why does it figure?"

James hesitated, and then said carefully, with the air of someone pulling the tail of a Hippogriff, "Well, it just seems like you always have a quill in hand."

She laughed. "I suppose that's true. In that case, it's fitting that you like Bertie Botts."

"Why?" He asked, already grinning.

"Because you need to have some amount of risk in everything you do."

He laughed openly, loudly, and picked up his box of Bertie Botts Every Flavor Beans. "It's the Gryffindor in me. I'm too brave for my own good."

Once the compartment had been scattered with wrappers, they set back into planning. By the time they'd rolled into Hogsmeade, Lily had covered two whole rolls of parchment with her chickenscratch writing. She rolled them up with brisk efficiency, and stuck them in the pocket of the robes she'd donned earlier in the trip.

"Well Potter," she said, standing. "Good meeting. See you up at the castle?"

"Sure thing," he said. When she slid the compartment door closed behind her, she caught a flash of disappointment cross his face as he watched her leave.

The hallway was flooded with students. She weaved her way through them in search of Alice or Severus. She was halfway down the train when Frank Longbottom burst out of a compartment in front of her.

"Frank!"

He grinned at the sight of her, and turned back into the compartment. "Alice, I found her!"

A moment later, Alice struggled her way out of the compartment. "Where've you been? We figured you'd come back once the Prefects started patrolling!"

"The Heads traditionally have a meeting after the Prefects leave about the goals for the year," Lily explained, but Alice was only half listening. She was busy peering around Lily and up the corridor.

"Where's James? We heard he's Head Boy."

"News flies fast around here," said Lily, slightly stiffly. "I left him back at the compartment."

"How was he?" asked Alice, her blue eyes roamed Lily's face, as though they'd find the answer written there. "We heard that he seemed… different."

"Who said that?"

"Amelia Bones stopped by on her patrols. Said you seemed half stunned when he stood up to give a speech, and that Potter looked, I dunno, dark or something."

Frank laughed. "I think the words she used were 'darkly handsome.'"

Lily shook her head, thoughts spinning. So she wasn't the only one who had noticed. "It was strange. But we can talk about it later, I can't be gossiping about my fellow Head in the corridor."

They rocked on their feet as the train pulled to a stop. Outside, the night air was crisp with fall. She inhaled the familiar scent, and then turned for her first glimpse of Hogwarts that year. The sight of it towering in the distance with the inky black of the lake at its feet made her stomach lurch with excitement. Soon she'd be home.

Lily, Alice and Frank climbed in a carriage, and at the last second, Snape joined them. Alice was always polite to him, a fact that Lily appreciated immensely, but after he'd called Lily a "mudblood" back in fifth year her best friend had trouble being genuinely friendly. Once the carriage had moved off, Alice brought up James again.

"I just wonder what must have happened to him to make him change so much," she said. "I mean, wasn't it just like three months ago that he bewitched all of the toilets to overflow every time Slughorn sat down?"

Lily's lips twitched despite herself. "Yeah, the last week of Spring term. Filch was furious."

"Maybe," said Snape darkly, "he's moved onto bigger projects."

Lily glanced at him. She hadn't forgotten about his theory, and with the recent changes in Potter's behavior, she wondered if there wasn't some validity to it. "He was all for inter-house friendships during our meeting though," she said, trying to be rational. "If he was on the wrong side of things I doubt he'd be spouting that off. I mean, the height of his immaturity was spent cursing First Year Slytherins."

"Think about it though," Snape's eyes flickered to Lily as he spoke. "If he wanted to get involved with Dark Magic, what better guise does he have than to promote school unity? It's the Slytherins who really have the connections he would need. And regardless, the Dark Lord doesn't want only Slytherins to rule. He wants purebloods."

"And Potter is a pureblood. Come to think of it, so are Peter and Sirius… I'm not sure about Remus though," mused Lily.

Frank was watching Snape with barely concealed dislike. "Why'd you call him the Dark Lord?"

Snape met his gaze with inscrutably black eyes. "I prefer to say that over Voldemort."

The horseless carriage pulled up outside the castle, and Lily scrambled out with relief. Snape climbed down behind her. "See you around, Lily," he said before slipping into a group of Slytherins.

"What a load of dung," said Alice as soon as he was out of earshot. "He just doesn't want you taking a liking to James's new maturity because he's in love with you."

"He's not in love with me," said Lily annoyed. "And I actually think he has a good point. In all my years of knowing the Marauders, they've demonstrated over and over again that they're evil. I mean, remember when they strung Sev up by the ankle just because they were bored? Or the time they locked that second year Slytherin in the Room of Requirement for a week? Or even-"

"Okay, Lils, we get the point." Alice's round face was set. "But you have to admit you've always held a grudge against them, and Snape's saying exactly what you want to hear."

"Well I'm going to keep on eye on them regardless."

Alice turned to Frank. "Frank-"

He held up his hands. "I'm not getting involved in this. I don't like Snape, but it's Lily's business what she thinks about the Marauders."

Alice glowered at him. At this point they'd reached the Great Hall, and Lily purposefully sat down next to Marlene McKinnon and asked her how her summer had gone. With a sigh, Alice sat down across from her and greeted her fellow Gryffindors.

The Marauders, Lily noted, slunk in the door just before the First Years arrived, and huddled at the emptiest end of the table, their heads bowed inward as they talked. Lily watched them through the sorting, wishing that she could hear them over the cheering that accompanied each First Year getting sorted.

Finally, Dumbledore stood up and gave his speech, warning the students not to enter the Forbidden Forest, and reminding them to check the boards in their common rooms for news on Quidditch trials. Lily half listened to it. By this point, her chocolate frog and sugar quill of the afternoon felt like ages ago. At last, with a flourish of his hands, Dumbledore sat down, and mounds of food appeared on the empty golden platters.

Lily and Alice both reached immediately for the Shepherd's pie, and then laughed, the tension from earlier dissipating.

She looked down to plop a thick slice of pie onto her plate, and found a bright white note lying neatly in the middle of it. It read, in thin, slanting handwriting: "Heads meeting, this Tuesday at 7pm. Headmaster's office. Password: Acid pop." She looked up to find Dumbledore watching her. He winked, and then turned back to his plate. Lily slipped it out of the way, and happily dug into her long awaited dinner.


	3. Unusual Invitations

**A/N: I hope you enjoy the story! I'd love feedback-reviews are always welcome, because they help me know what I'm doing well and what I'm doing poorly. **

**Disclaimer: I am not JK Rowling, nor do I own the Harry Potter universe. **

Over the next couple weeks, Lily was quickly pulled into the familiar schedule of classes, homework, and Head duties. She and James met with Dumbledore about their Headship, and explained to him their ideas for promoting interhouse unity. Dumbledore was delighted, and agreed (much to Lily's chagrin), with James that benches that dumped people out of them would be great fun.

"Sometimes a bit of mischief adds just the right amount of glamor to what might have otherwise been an unpopular idea," he'd told her, with a smile in James' direction.

James, on the other hand, seemed to have lost the mischievousness that had marked his prior six years at the school. He continued to be courteous and polite, and not only to Lily, but to everyone around him. Rather than assuaging Lily's suspicions about him, however, this only worsened them.

It didn't help that the Marauders seemed to have become even more secretive since the beginning of the year. They no longer held court in the Gryffindor common room, entertaining girls with games of exploding snap and showing off their new acquisitions from Wonko's. Instead, they were rarely to be seen except for in classes.

Alice rolled her eyes when Lily attempted to explain her theory. "You mean he's been kind and polite to everyone around him, and so you've decided he's some sort of dark wizard?" She asked in exasperation as they walked down to Potions together. "Lily, he probably just finally grew up!"

Lily shook her head stubbornly. "No, I swear there's something else going on. I just… know, okay? It's not that he's matured, it's that he's not even Potter at all anymore!"

Alice pressed her lips together and refused to say anything else on the subject, and Lily was in such a bad temper during potions that she overbrewed her Calming Draught. To make it worse, she'd offered some to Severus on the sly, as he'd been looking rather jittery, and rather than calming him down it had put him into a deep sleep. He had snored through the rest of the class, while Lily subtly tried to prod him awake.

She hung back as the rest of the class flooded out to head to different classes, wanting to apologize to Severus for putting him to sleep. As she bent down to vanish the last of her potion from her cauldron, Potter and Remus caught her eye. They were walking toward the door, heads bowed in deep conversation.

Lily glanced over at where Slughorn was attempting to "ennervate" Severus awake, muttering all the while about the sleep deprivation that all serious students suffered from. She shouldered her bag, and followed them out the door.

Instead of heading back up into the castle, the two boys turned deeper into the dungeons. Lily followed, careful not to trip on the rugged flagstones. They stopped just around the corner.

"-and Avery said they were recruiting?" James' voice was low, intense.

"Yeah, he said that they particularly wanted my sort."

"Good. When's the next... session?"

"Our first Hogsmeade weekend."

"That works nicely. We'll be able to help you prepare. Not that you don't know what to do."

"I'll do whatever I have to to convince them." Lupin said fervently.

A shiver slid up Lily's spine that had nothing to do with the chill of the dungeons. Her heart was pumping quickly in her chest, fueled by adrenaline. She backed away from the corner, and then turned tail, and ran.

"Where were you?" hissed Alice as she slid into her seat in Charms. "I thought you were going to be late!"

"I have to talk to you about Potter," Lily whispered as Flitwick called for their attention.

Alice cast her eyes toward the ceiling. "Not that again."

Lily sighed, and turned to face Flitwick. She smoothed her notebook out in front of her, forcing her mind off of Potter and onto Charms. However, she did note that neither of them turned up for the entire class-behavior that was very unlike Remus.

After Charms, Lily and Alice headed out to the grounds to enjoy the mild fall weather. They found a place under a rugged oak, and Lily told her what she'd overheard Potter saying.

"He said Avery's name?" Alice pushed her blonde hair behind her ears. "That is weird. I mean, he definitely runs with the Death Eater crowd."

"Exactly! And saying that they were recruiting… I mean what else could he be talking about?"

"Well, let's not jump to any conclusions, but it does sound suspicious." They stared out at the glassy water of the lake for a few long moments. "What are you going to do about it?"

Lily paused. She'd been pondering this, and it was the part she most wanted to talk to Alice about. "Er, well, I was thinking-" she could feel her cheeks heat up, "-that I might ask James to go to Hogsmeade with me. And see what he says. Because if he turns me down, then we'll know that there's something serious going on. And if he agrees, then I'll be able to keep an eye on him, and I might be able to figure out what Remus is doing."

Alice smirked. "So the prat is finally going to get his dream come true. And what if he isn't involved in anything fishy, and you end up breaking his heart?"

"He'll survive," said Lily callously. "And besides, I'm pretty certain I'm right. Do you think it'll work though? I mean he hasn't even asked me out once this year."

Alice laughed. "You can't see the way he looks at you in class when you answer a question correctly. It's like he glows a little."

"I almost always answer questions correctly," said Lily, slightly defensive.

"Yeah, well, he's pretty much constantly glowing."

They both laughed. Lily pictured Potter at the back of the classroom, looking like he'd swallowed a lightbulb.

"'Ey! Lily!"

They both sat up, hands flying automatically to their wands.

"Not gon' curse me are yeh?" Rubeus Hagrid, the Hogwarts groundskeeper was trundling across the grounds toward them, his bushy beard buffeted by the wind.

"Oh! Hagrid!" Lily jumped to her feet to give him a body-shaking hand shake. He smelled like woodsmoke and leather.

"Been waitin' for yeh to come visit. Have a favor to ask."

Alice caught Lily's eye warily. Last year Hagrid had tried to introduce them to a vicious, three headed puppy he'd dubbed 'Fluffy.'

"Ask away," said Lily, hoping that it was the sort of favor she could potentially back out of if necessary.

"Ollivander wrote and asked if I could harves' some unicorn hair-fer his wands, see. It don't hurt 'em none, but I've 'ad a right bit of trouble getting near 'em. An' they like girls better..." He glanced nervously at Lily.

"That sounds brilliant!" said Lily earnestly. "I'll definitely do it!"

Hagrid beamed. "That's jus' great. Won' be fer a couple weeks, but I'll send yeh an owl."

He invited them to take a peek at the pumpkins he'd started for the feast that year, and so they walked over to admire them. Already, a couple were the size of a hubcap, and Lily spotted his pink umbrella propped up against the side of his house. She'd always had her suspicions about it.

"Why do you always get invited to do the fun things with him?" asked Alice once they had said goodbye to Hagrid and headed toward the castle.

"It's probably just cause I gave him one of those lily petal fishes for Christmas last year."

"You mean the same thing you gave Slughorn? Where the lily petal turns into a fish?"

"Yep." She gave Alice her sweetest smile.

"You're the biggest bootlicker I've ever met."

Lily's smile grew. "It always pays off though, doesn't it?"

Alice snorted and held the front door of the castle open for her friend.

Over the next two weeks, Lily watched Potter constantly, hoping to catch him alone. However, he seemed to disappear from the castle whenever he wasn't in class, and no amount of searching revealed him. She also had a heavy load of homework building up, so that she was forced to spend most evenings buried under a pile of books.

Not even their Head meetings yielded an opportunity-lately they had been meeting with different groups of Prefects, working on tactics for interhouse unity, and gathering reports of how previous efforts had gone. After every meeting, James bid her a cheery good night, and then slipped out the door with the rest of the Prefects.

Soon the outer edges of the Forbidden Forest were dotted with bright oranges, reds and yellows as the leaves began to change. The trip to Hogsmeade was one week away, and Lily had yet to ask James.

That Monday, she walked into Transfiguration determined to get him alone. Thankfully, luck seemed to be on her side. Once the class had settled into their usual seats, McGonagall stood, and they fell silent.

"Today we will be working on transfiguring body parts. For this reason, I have assigned you partners with whom you are to work." She looked around at them, as though daring them to complain about not being able to choose, and Lily might have imagined it, but she thought that her gaze lingered on Potter and Black. "It is my reasoning that you will be much less likely to abuse this skill if you are not partnered with your closest friends. Now, the pairings." She rattled them off without looking at the list that lay in front of her. Lily's heart leapt when she heard her name next to Potter's.

"When you get into your pairs, you will take turns turning your partner's fingers into mice or lizards. Once I have observed this skill, you may move on to full arm transfigurations."

There was a moment of still when she finished speaking. "Well, get to it!" said McGonagall, and everyone jumped to their feet.

Lily turned to find James watching her with an expression half wary, half hopeful. "Shall we?" she asked him. He nodded, gathered his books and wand, and followed her to a back corner of the classroom.

"You're lucky this is my best subject," said Potter, with a smirk reminiscent of his normal self. Lily resisted the desire to roll her eyes. Transfiguration was the one O.W.L. that he'd beat her on, and he'd teased her mercilessly about it at the end of last year.

"Okay, so we're doing human to animal transfigurations today?" asked Lily, opening her book to the chapter she'd read the previous night.

"Yep, shouldn't be too hard."

Lily cast him a look, but he seemed to have meant it sincerely. Any transfiguration involving a human was generally a finicky and arduous process, with risk for permanent damage to the object of the spell. She took a deep breath. "Do you want to go first, or should I?"

"You can. Give me a lizard pinky, wouldya?" He smiled, and their eyes met accidentally. Lily felt her neck heat up.

She focused on her breathing for a moment, honing her concentration on the hand he had placed on their desk, and allowed her wand to do a complicated dance above his finger. A stubby, warty gecko, attached to his hand by the tail, squirmed in an attempt to escape. It still had knuckle lines on its back, and there was a little bit of nail between its eyes, but it was still a passable lizard.

"Very good Miss Evans! Five points to Gryffindor." McGonagall paused in her rounds to cast Lily a ghost of a smile.

Lily focused back in on his finger, waved her wand, and slowly the wriggling gecko turned back into a normal appendage. She couldn't help but notice that he had nice hands-with smooth, rounded nails and blunt finger tips.

"You're one hell of a witch, Evans," said James, examining his finger. Lily couldn't help it-she grinned at him.

Around them, the other students were in varying states of distress. Rolanda Hooch's partner had succeeded in turning her finger into a gerbil, but the rodent's tail had become detached from her hand, and it was now scurrying around her desk while Rolanda made desperate grabs at it. Peter Pettigrew (who had miraculously scraped a Pass in his Transfiguration owl and been admitted into the NEWT level) had accidentally morphed all of his partner's fingers into one giant rat.

Lily laid her hand out on the table for James to try. He pulled her wrist forward so that it was closer to him, and something in Lily's stomach twisted. Their gazes caught on each other for a long moment. Then James forced his concentration on her hand, and picked up his wand.

Lily closed her eyes, not wanting to watch. When she opened them, her middle finger had been transformed into a wriggling snake. The way it twined around her fingers reminded her of the Death Eater skull and snake that had marked the front of her newspaper at home.

A breath later, and her finger was a normal finger. They switched back and forth for the next half hour, and then McGonagall gave them permission to start on whole arm transfigurations. Once James had turned her arms into horse legs a couple of times, and she'd given him flippers, they laid down their wands.

"Not a bad way to spend a class," remarked James, watching the others work. "McGonagall should've known better than to pair her two star students."

"I have a hunch that she was hoping I'd keep you in line."

"Smart of her," said James lightly. "We do make a good team though, don't we?"

Lily's glanced at him. He was watching her steadily, his hazel eyes scrunched into a smile behind his glasses. Now was the moment, she was sure of it. She took a deep breath. "We do. I ah, I actually." The words stuck, and she swallowed to try to re-lubricate her throat. "I was, uh, wondering if maybe you'd want to go to Hogsmeade with me. This weekend."

For a long moment, James was completely still. His fingers, which had been tapping a rhythm on the desk, fell silent. He stared at her. "You're not joking?"

A wave of embarrassed heat moved up her body. "No, uh no. I just-you've changed. And I've been meaning to ask…"

His face split into a huge, sloppy grin. "Yeah, I want to go with you!" He gazed at her, and the look reminded her a bit of the slavish devotion their old golden retriever had used to beam in her direction.

Lily smiled shakily at him, "Great, great then. Glad that's settled."

James chatted excitedly about it for the rest of the class, picking her brain about her favorite places to go, her favorite foods to eat, and how she'd like to order their day. When McGonagall dismissed them, he lingered for a moment, but when Lily told him she had to gather all her things, bounded off to find Sirius. Watching him run out of the door, Lily felt a surge of unexpected remorse.


	4. Swallowed Stones

**A/N: Here's the next chapter! The one after this is also finished, and the one after that, but I'm trying not to post them all at once. The story starts to pick up a bit after this one. Thanks for hanging in there, and as always, feedback is appreciated!**

**Disclaimer: I am not JK Rowling, and I don't own her characters or world. **

"So, you asked Potter," Alice stated as she strode into their room later that evening. Lily glanced around at the other beds. They were blessedly empty.

"I did. How'd you hear?"

"The boy's over the moon about it. He told Black, obviously, and then I overheard Black talking to Amos Diggory and Poppy Pomfrey in the hall-" she trailed off at the look on Lily's face. "Lily, you had to expect this. The boy's been asking you out about three times a day since first year! Of course people are going to talk."

Lily took a deep breath. "I suppose I knew James would tell Sirius," she said slowly, trying to work through her feelings as she spoke. "I mean of course he did. They're best friends. But I somehow… forgot about the rest of the school."

"People whispering that you're dating the Head Boy and Quidditch Captain isn't such a bad thing, you realize."

Lily looked down at her socks, which were decorated in little cauldrons, and plucked at a loose string. "He's just so excited," she whispered. "I didn't expect him to actually… care. Won't it hurt more if everyone knows about us when I end it?"

Alice sighed. "It's not like you promised to be his girlfriend or anything. You don't have any obligation beyond this Hogsmeade visit."

She looked up at that. It was true-it wasn't like she'd made any promises. And besides, if Potter was a wannabe Death Eater, he deserved to have his heart broken.

Pink light streamed into the tower room from the sunset outside, making her burgundy sheets glow red. Lily leaned back into them.

"Do you have a plan, then?" asked Alice. She leaned back on her own bed.

Lily thought about it. "I was sort of just planning to do whatever he wanted to do. Should I have a better plan?"

Alice frowned. "I'm not sure. Didn't Snape have some scuffle with him in the Shrieking Shack last year? Maybe go look around there with him, see if he acts funny."

"Yeah, that's a really good idea. Maybe James will let something slip."

They talked strategy until the sun had slipped behind the mountains, and then Lily sat up. "I'd better get started on my Potions essay."

They trooped downstairs to claim a spot near the fireplace. Potter was nowhere to be seen, but Black and Pettigrew were playing exploding snap in the corner (or rather, Peter was playing exploding snap while Sirius flirted with three third year girls). Sirius Black was definitely the handsomest Marauder, with his smooth black hair and sharp, intelligent gaze. But he was wilder, less predictable than Potter, and a certain dark seriousness lingered beneath every prank he was involved in. Most of the female population of Hogwarts was half in love, half terrified of him. James was easier to have a normal, teenage crush on.

"Despicable," whispered Lily. She tore her eyes away from them, and tried to focus on her essay. An hour later, and she'd only finished half a roll. All she could think about was the way James' fingers had stopped tapping when she'd asked him. She replayed the motion over and over again in her mind. She put down her essay, frustrated.

"What's wrong?" asked Alice, looking over from where she'd been scratching steadily away at her Arithmancy.

"I have a headache. I think I might head up to bed."

"I've got some Fillibree's Pain-Eez in my trunk if you want it," said Alice, her eyes lingered on Lily for a moment, and Lily could see that she wanted to say something more, but wasn't sure if she should.

"Thanks." Lily turned before she had the chance. Her limbs felt very heavy. She was exhausted, that was all. She'd feel better after some rest.

The next morning, she awoke to sun piercing through a crack in the heavy curtains that surrounded her bed. She stretched, and pulled them back to reveal a room flooded in sunshine. Everyone else's curtains were still stretched tight. She rubbed her eyes, pulled on her robes, and headed down to breakfast with her Potions book and essay in hand.

The Great Hall was mostly empty at this hour, and so Lily was free to sip tea and finish her essay. She was just starting on the conclusion-which drew together her claim that antidotes were similar to muggle vaccines in that they gave the drinker a non-lethal dose of the elements of the poison-when someone slid into the seat next to her.

Lily jolted, startled, and looked up into bright hazel eyes. Her stomach squirmed. "Potter!" She sounded distinctly McGonagall-ish.

His smile faded a little. "Do you mind if I sit with you?"

"Oh, no. You just surprised me." She tried to focus back on the last few sentences of her essay, but with him sitting so close all of the distractions of last night rushed in. With resignation, she rolled it up. It wasn't due for another two days regardless.

Potter seemed to be thinking the same thing. "Isn't that due Wednesday?" he asked.

"Yes, well, I have a lot of other things to get done as well."

To his credit, Potter didn't comment. Instead he dumped some brown sugar over his porridge, and began to methodically stir it in.

"You're up awfully early," Lily remarked, after a few long moments of silence.

"Or awfully late," James remarked. For the first time that morning, she really looked at him. He had bags under his eyes, and his hair was distinctly disheveled. She shooed away the thought that if anything, he looked even more mysterious and handsome.

She frowned. "Were you up all night?"

"Just about." He ran a hand over his face and then up through his hair.

"Why?" She let her toast fall to her plate as she turned her whole attention to him.

He shrugged. "Helping out a friend."

"Remus?"

There was a flash of something in his eyes-fear? And then it was gone, and he smirked at her. "Why do you think it was Remus?"

Lily pointed toward the door. "Because he just walked in, and he looks about as tired as you do." Which was true-he had a matching pair of bags under his eyes, and he was looking particularly pale. Remus raised his eyebrows at the sight of the two of them sitting peaceably together. If anything, Lily thought once he'd sat down across from them, he looked even tireder than James.

James took the opportunity to bring up his new favorite subject-the Hogsmeade date. "So Remus, where do you think me and Lily should go Saturday?"

Remus smiled wanly at him. "My favorite is Honeydukes. Or Dervish and Banges. Where do you want to go, Lily?"

Lily pretended to think for a moment. "Well, it's been awhile since I've visited the Shrieking Shack, and this time of year always gets me in the mood for haunted places…" She watched James carefully, but he'd shoved a giant bite of porridge in his mouth as she spoke, and it was difficult to read his expression.

"Sure," he said once he'd swallowed.

The Great Hall was beginning to fill up as students trickled in before their first classes of the day. Lily tried to ignore the fact that a lot of curious gazes seemed to be directed toward her and James.

"Well, it seems as though most of the school knows now," announced Sirius as he slid onto the bench beside James. His flipped his glossy black hair out of his eyes. Peter plopped down on the other side of him, slightly out of breath. Being surrounded by the Marauders was a distinctly uncomfortable experience for Lily-she was used to being well on the outside of their group.

"Knows what?" Asked Remus. He didn't bother to look up from the book he'd cracked under the table.

"About our boy and Evans. I told about a quarter of them, just so I could gauge the reactions of the student body-you know, as a favor to you two." He looked calculatingly at Lily, and even though his tone was light, she felt suddenly chilled. "Anyway, about 75% of females rated themselves as feeling less-than-pleased that James is off the market, and 25% (mostly Slytherins) said that you two deserved each other. The male population unanimously agreed that it gave them hope for their own unrequited loves, and felt generally positive toward the coupling."

James's neck had grown red throughout Sirius's explanation. "Can I talk to you alone for a second, mate?"

For some inexplicable reason, Sirius cast a second cold glance in Lily's direction, and then got up to follow James out of the Great Hall.

"What was that about?" asked Lily, as she watched the giant door close behind them.

Remus sighed. "Sirius isn't the most pleased about you and James going out."

"Why?" asked Lily, stunned. "Doesn't he want James to be happy?"

"Of course he does. From what I heard last night-and I was trying not to listen, mind you-it sounds like Sirius thinks you're up to something, and is trying to prove that you aren't really interested in James by pushing your buttons. It's completely ridiculous…"

"Yeah," added Peter. "Sirius told me that you were probably just trying to find a new way to rip James's heart apart."

Lily forced a laugh. She felt suddenly hollow inside.

Peter didn't seem to notice that Remus was shooting him dagger-looks from across the table. "I mean, he's been working so hard to be all mature for you, and Sirius always says that you should like him for who he actually is, even if he is a bit of a-"

"Peter," said Remus finally, tone firm. "James wouldn't want-."

"He's being mature for me?" The words came out barely above a whisper.

Remus shook his head. "James realized he needed to do a lot of growing up these past few months. I think you were part of the motivation to do that, but he also had a really difficult summer."

"Why was it difficult?"

Peter opened his mouth to answer, but Remus cut him off. "That's something you'll have to ask him."

Lily nodded, though inside she was burning with curiosity. She looked down at her cold toast. Suddenly she didn't feel very hungry. "Well, I had better get to class." Remus looked a bit troubled, but let her go.

Lily had almost made it to Defense Against the Dark Arts when someone caught her arm. She spun around, adrenaline pulsing through her veins, to find herself face to face with Severus. "I need to speak with you for a moment," he said.

"You scared me," said Lily. Then she noticed the mutinous expression he wore. "What's wrong?"

He gestured to an empty classroom, and she followed him inside. "Potter. You're going to Hogsmeade with Potter." He scrunched a fist in his hair, and for a moment he reminded her forcibly of James.

"Yes, I am." She crossed her arms. "And you are jumping to conclusions."

"How am I jumping to conclusions?" A spark of reluctant hope flitted across his face.

For a moment Lily wanted to drag it out longer, to refuse to admit the real reason she was going to Hogsmeade with Potter just to make him suffer. But then it passed, and he was her best friend since before time, and the one person who'd known her pre-Hogwarts. "I was thinking about what you said, about Potter and the dark arts, and I decided to do my own research. I figured the best way to know for sure would be to spend a lot of time with him. Observe him, you know."

Severus relaxed enough to unknot his hand from his hair, but he still looked angry. "And what if he is involved with the Dark Lord? What if he drags you into all of this mess?"

"I'll tell Dumbledore," said Lily coolly.

"Yeah, and what's Dumbledore going to do if your family becomes a target?" Snape sneered. "The Dark Lord wants purebloods on his side, and if knows that Potter has a weak spot for you…"

"Yeah, and how would you know what the Dark Lord wants?" Lily shot back at him. She felt irrationally angry. Snape was right in a lot of ways, and that scared her. Getting involved meant risking her family, her friends, her stability. But, a tiny part of her-the part that she was proud of-whispered that if she didn't act, millions of innocent muggles and muggleborns would be at risk because of it. She was a Gryffindor, and that meant she was brave enough to do the right thing. "Listen, I know that you care about me, and that you care about my family, and that's why you're worried. I feel the same way, Sev. But this is a war. And if I don't try to fight for what I believe in, for what I know is right, then what type of person would that make me?"

Snape opened his mouth to argue, but then closed it again. He knew better than anyone that Lily could not sit by while injustice was happening. He met her eyes, his black gaze boring into her emerald one. "Just promise me, Lily. Please promise me that you'll be safe." His face collapsed, overcome by emotion. "I don't know what I would do without you."

She pulled him in for a hug. "I know, Sev. I promise to do my best." After a long moment they broke apart. "I really have to run. I'll see you later?"

"Yeah," said Snape as she swept out the door. His voice was hollow in her absence. "See you later."

Later that day, Lily stumbled through the portrait hole to an inordinate amount of noise. She looked around, absorbed the fact that Sirius and James were shouting at each other from across the common room, and promptly turned around. She'd go to the library.

As she walked, she tried to remember the last time she'd heard the Marauders fight. They'd had their tiffs of course, but nothing like this. In fact, the only time she could remember Black and Potter disagreeing was during that time last year when Severus had gotten tangled up in one of their misdeeds at the Shrieking Shack. They hadn't spoken for days after that incident, and Hogwarts had felt bizarrely quiet without their pranks.

In fact, it had felt a little bit like this year so far.

In ways, she missed the mayhem. Not so much that she missed turning corners and finding that the Marauders had enchanted the corridor to turn everyone's pants invisible (including Slughorn's), or having to dock points from Gryffindor because they'd fed the first years a Babbling Brew (which caused the drinker to spout whatever thought crossed his or her mind). No, she certainly didn't miss those things. She just missed… the laughter.

By this point she'd reached the library, and she took a seat at a table in the far back, away from the usual cluster of library dwellers. She'd only been there a few minutes when Potter poked his head around a bookshelf. A faint tint of pink still lay across his cheeks. "Mind if I join you?"

Lily moved her books over by way of answer, and James sat down. He rummaged through his bag, and pulled out their potions book and a roll of parchment. For a moment they both sat, silently staring at their work. Lily felt very aware of herself-of how her feet rested on the floor, how her hair fell heavily down her back. Potter shifted towards her, and her pulse sped up in her wrists. But he was only reaching down to pull a quill out of his bag.

She exhaled deeply, cast away any thoughts of Potter, and got back to work. They'd been working for the better part of an hour when she glanced up to find that he was watching her. A wrinkle of worry had worked its way across his forehead.

"Are you okay?" She whispered, closing her book unconsciously.

"Yeah, I was just-I was trying to think of how best to apologize for what Sirius said earlier. And what Pettigrew and Lupin told you. You shouldn't have to hear that stuff." He spoke kindly, but she could detect a trace of wariness in his expression, as though she could snap at any moment.

"You can't help that stuff." She looked down to where her fingers had begun tracing the grain of the table.

"I just wish Sirius wasn't being a berk about this. He knows how important it is to me." As he said this, he avoided her gaze, and some of the pink tinge from earlier crept back into his cheeks.

"He just cares about you, Potter. He's protective. I guess-I guess I was pretty mean to you, before. You guys are like brothers, it's his job to watch out for you."

James smiled at her, and she smiled woodenly back at him. Inside, she felt a bit like she'd swallowed a stone, and it had lodged itself somewhere in her chest.

When they had both finished with their work, they walked slowly back up to the common room together.

"Do you have any siblings?" Potter blurted at her, as they jumped over the missing stair in the staircase.

She couldn't resist shooting an odd look at him. "Um, yes, I have an older sister. Do you?"

"Just Sirius, but I suppose he doesn't really count. How old's your sister?"

"20. She actually just got engaged. Bit young, if you ask me, but she seems to know what she's doing."

"Are you close?"

"It's complicated." Lily glanced up to find him watching her, hazel eyes intent. He seemed suddenly very tall, as though she had to tilt her head up further than usual to look at him. "We were very close as kids. But then I got my letter, and I think she was jealous. And we only really see each other on holiday, and then she's off with her friends or her fiance." She frowned. "I mean, we love each other. We just… don't really know each other any more."

James's lip quirked up. "I was always sort of glad that I was an only child, though it got a bit lonely sometimes with two Aurors as parents."

"Amortentia," said Lily. The Fat Lady winked at her and swung open. Lily followed James inside. When they reached the stairs, she gave him a shy smile. "See you tomorrow, then."

He grinned, his teeth very white in the low light of the common room. "Can't wait!"

When Lily had made it up to their dormitory, she climbed into Alice's bed, pulled the curtains closed, and cast a muffliato charm. Alice looked up from the book she'd been reading, saw the look on Lily's face, and set it down. "What's wrong?"

She told Alice about how James had found her in the library to apologize. "I just-I just feel horrible. I keep reminding myself why I'm doing this, but he seems so genuinely happy, and Sirius knows that I'm lying, but James won't believe him, and-" she paused to breathe.

"Lily," said Alice. "Are you sure you want to do this?"

"If I can't do this, then how will I ever be an auror? I have to be able to do this kind of thing. I have to be able to lie, and to do things for the greater good!"

"But what if James is innocent? What if it isn't for the greater good?" prodded Alice. Her normally patient expression had turned a bit mulish.

"Then at least we'll know that! He's just-he's so confusing. One minute he's so serious, so secretive with his friends, and then the next he's asking me about my sister and looking at me like-like I caught him the moon or something, and Alice, I just don't know how to handle it!"

Alice's features softened. "You're starting to fancy him, aren't you?"

"No!" insisted Lily. "I just feel bad for him-and I'm not used to lying."

Alice cast her eyes toward the ceiling. "Well it seems like you have it worked out to me, then. If it's for the 'Greater Good' then you don't have much choice, do you? It won't hurt anything to poke around in Hogsmeade. Not even Sirius can blame you if you go on a date together, and then don't get on as well as you thought you might."

Lily let the words soothe her, despite the fact that she knew her friend was frustrated with her. "Yeah, that's true. Thanks Alice."

She climbed out of the shelter of Alice's bed, and into her own. She thought about what James had said about Sirius being his brother and smiled. They were sort of sweet together, even if they were both Death Eater wannabes.


	5. Howling Hogsmeade

**A/N: And the plot begins to thicken! As always, feedback is appreciated and taken into deep consideration. **

**Disclaimer: As much as I wish I was, I am not JK Rowling. That logically leads to the fact that I don't own any of her work.**

The rest of the week slid by easily and quickly. Potter sought her out each day for one reason or another, always acting polite and oddly courteous-trying to hold doors open for her and asking her questions about her family and her preferences. Lily felt a bit like she was being courted like some woman in an old fashioned movie, but she didn't complain. It was far better than having essays bewitched to fly around your head, asking you out, or having your best friend used as ransom for a date to Hogsmeade.

The morning of the date dawned crisp and sunny. Lily felt unexpectedly nervous. She spent extra time fussing with her hair that morning, and practically jumped when Potter walked through the door of the Great Hall at breakfast.

He looked… handsome. Like how a girl's first date to Hogsmeade ought to look. He'd chosen a gold and red striped sweater that brought out the gold in his eyes, and his hair was looking even more windswept than usual.

Lily smiled nervously at him, and he held out an arm. From across the Great Hall, Severus caught her eye. He was glowering at the pair of them, his hair falling lank around his face. She gave him a little wave, and then set off with James.

They took their time walking up to the village, Lily revelling in the beautiful fall colors that lined the path and James going out of his way to step on all of the crunchiest leaves. At first their conversation was a bit stiff-James admitted that on most of his dates he usually just talked about Quidditch, and Lily laughed. That wouldn't quite cut it for her.

"Well, so what did you do before you knew about magic?" he asked finally.

"You mean for fun?"

He laughed. "Yeah, don't muggles have fun?"

"Sure they do," Lily said earnestly. "Er-well I was pretty young. Me and Tuney used to spend a lot of time at the park, on the swings and things."

"The swings?"

"Er-like a board attached to two ropes that's tied way high up so that you can swing through the air on it, sort of."

"That sounds dangerous," said James, alarmed. "They let children on those things?"

Lily laughed at him. "No more dangerous than a broomstick. And they're great fun. I showed some of my first signs of being magic on the swings." She was quiet for a moment, remembering. "That's actually how I met Severus."

"You knew him before Hogwarts?" asked James, amazed. "I always thought you two just banded together on the train!"

Lily glanced at him, worried that this wasn't a great topic for them to have landed on, but James merely looked interested. "He saw me flying off of the swings when I was around 9 or so. He told me what I was," she smiled, remembering. "At first I thought he was crazy, but then I came around to the idea-I mean, there was no denying I was different. We used to meet at the park, and he'd tell me about the magical world, about Dementors and broomsticks and the sorting hat and Azkaban."

"I never realized," James murmured.

"Would you have acted differently?" asked Lily primly.

He grinned. "Probably not, no. I would've been worse if anything. Jealousy, and all that."

Lily couldn't help it-his honesty made her laugh. After that, things eased between them. James kept up a steady stream of questions or chatter, and soon they'd made it to Hogsmeade. They started out with Honeydukes, and James challenged her to an ice mice eating contest. They walked down the street afterwards with their teeth chattering and squeaking, and James had to keep stopping so that he could laugh, chatter, and breathe all at the same time. By the time they reached Dervish and Banges, Lily's sides hurt from laughing.

They ducked in through the door, and James immediately led her to the Fizzing Whizbees section. After he'd purchased some dungbombs and a few of their flashiest new fireworks, they started off for the next store. Soon, James had introduced the idea of buying something in every single store, and so they set off to do it. It appeared as though James wasn't worried about the number of galleons disappearing from his pockets, because he did most of the buying. The one thing Lily insisted on purchasing was their butterbeer from the Three Broomsticks.

The sun was low on the horizon and Lily's feet were tired by the time they stepped out of their last stop: The Hog's Head. There was only one place they hadn't yet visited, and it was the one she most wanted to see.

"I know we can't buy anything there," began Lily. "But I would love to go see the Shrieking Shack."

For a moment Lily thought she caught a flash of concern in James' hazel eyes, but then it was gone. "Yeah, of course."

The path up to the shack was steep, and it was beginning to get dark. Lily followed in James's footsteps, careful not to stumble over one of the loose rocks that lined the way. When they reached the top, Lily turned around to see tangerine light spilling into Hogsmeade below them. "James," she said softly, and his face was lit up by the sunset as he turned.

"Beautiful," he said. Lily ignored the fact that his eyes lingered on her face as he said it-she suspected that yelling at him might ruin the moment. They found a spot in the grassy lawn in front of the shack, and sat down to watch as the sun slowly sunk lower.

"Do you ever miss your family when you're at Hogwarts?" asked Lily. She kept her eyes carefully on the sunset.

For a long moment, James didn't answer. Then he said, voice low, "You didn't happen to get the Daily Prophet over the summer, did you?"

"Er, yeah, I got it."

"Did you read it all the way through?"

"No-not always." Lily could feel her cheeks warming up, as though James were trying to challenge how worldly she really was.

"Okay," James let out a long, unhappy breath. "Listen Lily, I wasn't going to tell you this, because I don't particularly want your pity. But, yes I miss my parents. I miss them all of the time. It-it was in the paper. I thought maybe you already knew..."

It all clicked together. "What happened?" she hadn't meant to whisper, but that's all that escaped.

"They were working on a top secret mission. I wasn't allowed the details, but my dad had mentioned Inferi the week before. Something went wrong. They didn't come home that night, and shortly after Mad Eye Moody showed up at the door. You always know it's bad when the boss comes to talk to you."

Lily felt suddenly very cold. She heard herself apologize to him, felt herself move closer, wrap an arm around his shoulders as though that might comfort him. But inside, her thoughts whirled in a sickening circle. She'd been wrong. She must've been wrong. There was no way James could have turned to the dark arts after his parents had been killed because of them. She was just stringing him along, she was going to hurt him. She closed her eyes, trying to block the thoughts out, trying to concentrate on what he was saying.

He picked up her hand, held it between both of his. His palms were warm-almost hot. A string tightened within her, and she wondered vaguely if he could feel the way her pulse had begun to race. "Listen, Lily," he said. "I really, really want to be with you. But I want to do this right. I don't want my parents to be the reason you date me."

She needed to tell him the truth, but she just couldn't do it. His hands were too warm on her own, and his eyes were too sad. "Let's just see where it goes from here," she heard herself say. "No pressure. Nothing official."

James's face lit up. "But there is something?"

Before Lily could answer, a sound from the woods interrupted her. They both froze to listen-leaves crackled as something large navigated the brush. James yanked his wand out of his robes, and Lily followed suit.

The sun had finally dipped behind the city and it was dark up on the hill. Behind them, a waning moon had just topped the horizon. "Lumos," whispered Lily. Her wand tip lit up at the same time that Remus burst out of the woods. He looked ragged, scared.

"James, I need to talk to you."

They all watched each other for a moment, Remus eyeing Lily warily. Then James jumped into action. "Okay, Lily, you head back to the castle. The gates will be closed by now, so you'll need to take the secret passage from Honeyduke's cellar. That'll take you right into the castle. Just look for the trap door in the floor. And here," he reached under his robes, and pulled something silvery, almost liquid from them. "It's my invisibility cloak. Put it on, and do NOT take it off until you've reached the castle."

Lily took it wordlessly, and James turned back to Remus. In that instant, she knew that there was no chance she'd follow James's instructions. She pulled the cloak over her head, and felt the eerie sensation of looking down at the ground through her feet.

"Bye," she whispered, and started to walk down the path. After a few yards, however, she stopped, picked up a stone and tossed it down the hill. Both boys paused to watch it roll. They were silent for awhile, carefully watching the path where she was supposed to have retreated, and then they turned to each other.

"I don't know if I can do it," said Remus, the words coming out in a rush. "I stopped to look at the gathering, and Greyback's there-"

James shuddered. "I won't blame you if you decide not to." His hazel eyes were intense as he watched his friend's face.

Remus shook his head. "I need to do it. This whole thing depends on me. It just-it rattled me. There's rumors that he's in Voldemort's inner circle."

James's gaze softened, and for an instant Lily expected him to tell Remus not to do it, but then he took a deep breath. "That makes it even more important for you to be there." They stood in silence for a long moment, watching the moon rise up above the trees. "Why not I join you? Hidden, of course."

"They'd smell you."

"I'll stay downwind."

Remus shook his head, but Lily could tell that he'd been convinced. He ran a hand through his light brown hair. "Fine, but I swear James, if anything happens I'll never forgive myself."

Incredibly, James laughed. "Nothing will happen. I'm faster than any of them by a long shot." His eyes were bright, excited. It unnerved her more than anything else she'd heard or seen so far.

Remus cast him one last serious look, and then turned to melt back into the forest, with James in hot pursuit. Lily gave them time to get ahead-she wasn't confident in her ability to walk quietly over crunchy leaves. Soon it was so dark that she had to navigate simply by the sounds of their passage-the cracks of brittle branches under their feet, or the crashing of footsteps through dried leaves. The forest seemed to grab at her as she walked, clinging to the cloak, making it almost impossible to move silently.

She was just beginning to get tired when the crashing in front of her stopped. Lily sped up, eager to see what had stopped them. She rounded a corner, and in the dim moonlight that filtered through the canopy, she could just make out something large. The creature lifted its nose to the air, scenting, and then bobbed its head in her direction. A deer. It was huge, its giant antlers reaching up toward the sky like barren trees, its eyes liquid black in the dark woods.

It seemed to smell her. It took a step forward, and then another one. Lily backpedaled, her feet catching on low growing brush. The deer kept coming steadily forward, its head lowered, slender legs easily picking their way through the brambles. When it was about five feet away, Lily turned and ran.

Remus and James were nowhere to be found. Frustrated, Lily followed the broken trail that she'd left through the forest, ignoring the prickles of fear that kept trickling up her spine as she imagined predators following her. Finally, she broke free, back into clearing in front of the Shrieking Shack.

In the invisibility cloak it wasn't hard to slip undetected into Zonko's, nor was it difficult to find the trap door that James had told her about. The passage was long and cold, and even with the light of her wand, Lily kept tripping on the uneven flagstones. When at last she'd slipped out from behind the One Eyed Witch, Lily was cold and exhausted, and her knees were bruised from falling down.

It wasn't until she'd made it to the portrait hole that she took the cloak off, fingers trembling. "The Potter boy's lent you his cloak then?" asked the Fat Lady waspishly. "Late to be running around with him, isn't it?"

Lily ignored her. "Arachnid."

With a sigh, the Fat Lady swung open. Lily clambered through-her legs felt uncoordinated after the long walk through the forest. She clutched the cloak to her chest, and took the stairs two at a time to the dormitory.

Alice peeked out of her bed as Lily began to pull on her pajamas. "What happened?" she whispered. Her short blonde hair stuck up in odd directions.

"Let's go for a walk tomorrow morning," said Lily meaningfully. Marlene McKinnon's reading light glowed through the curtains around her bed.

Alice glanced at it and nodded.

It took Lily a long time to fall asleep that night. She felt too full of thoughts, of ideas, and she was dying to talk to Alice about them. Finally, however, she drifted off and dreamt of centaurs.

The next morning, the two girls grabbed some toast and headed out onto the grounds. Lily told her all about the day, followed by what she'd overheard that night.

"I just wish I hadn't lost them," she said. "It's obvious though, isn't it? They were going to attend some sort of meeting for Voldemort's supporters!"

"It does sound like that," said Alice carefully. "I just don't understand how James could betray his parents like that, after they'd been killed by..."

Lily shook her head. "Yeah, he'd have to be seriously messed up." They looked out over the Great Lake, watching as the merpeople set out netting on the far shore.

"Are you going to turn them into Dumbledore?" asked Alice. Her soft blue eyes were as round as galleons.

"I don't think so. Not yet anyway. I can't really go to him and tell him I overheard them talking about Voldemort. Everyone's talking about Voldemort."

Alice looked doubtful. "I think you should tell him, Lily. Then at least he'll be able to keep an eye on them."

"Yeah," said Lily hesitantly. "I don't really fancy telling him that his Head Girl broke school rules to follow the Head Boy into the Forbidden Forest. Especially when I don't have anything other than hearsay to report. I dunno Alice, I really think with a little more time I could figure this out."

"You'll have to keep up this weird fake relationship with Potter," Alice pointed out. "If it turns out he is innocent and you were wrong, you'll come off looking like a real arse."

"It'll be worth it though, won't it?" She didn't mention the fact that the Auror Academy would be sure to accept her if she applied with two captured Death Eaters to her name, nor the fact that some bizarre, small part of her had really enjoyed that date, adventure and all.

Alice looked like she wanted to argue, and so Lily turned toward Hagrid's hut. "Let's go see Hagrid."

Alice gave a quiet "hmph," but followed her anyway.


	6. Unicorn Hair

**A/N: Hope you enjoy the next chapter! As always, reviews are better than puppies. And I like puppies a lot.**

**Disclaimer: I own none of this. **

The next few weeks flew by without incident. The Halloween feast went off with great success-Hagrid's pumpkins were horse sized and a live colony of bats swooped through the hall. Lily had been nervous about how their interhouse seating would go, but surprisingly, the students bore it with goodwill.

At first there was general uproar at the fact that they all were to be seated at one giant, long table. And then there was absolute mayhem as people attempted to sit next to their friends and got dumped on their butts.

Even Lily forgot, and when she went to sit next to James to ask how he thought it was going, she was dumped unceremoniously on her bum. Thankfully Dumbledore had thought to pair the jinx with a cushioning charm. She'd ignored the uproarious laughter, brushed off her robes, and went to sit next to Severus. Periodic cackling interrupted the feast as students forgot, and got dumped onto the floor.

Lily was pleased to see that those who were seated seemed to be chatting happily with their schoolmates. There were even a few Slytherin, Gryffindor neighbors.

Afterwards, Lily gave James a huge hug out of excitement. "Your idea was brilliant!" she said.

He beamed.

Outside the castle, the weather had turned wintry. The halls seemed more crowded due to no one wanting to take breaks outside any longer, and it was difficult to find good seats in the Gryffindor common room.

Lily and James had become regular partners in Transfiguration, but that was the only real time they had the chance to talk. While Lily tried to focus on giving him a moustache, or hook nose, or blonde hair, he'd distract her with ridiculous questions about her life.

"Why all the questions?" She asked him one day as they walked out of Transfiguration.

He rubbed at the back of his neck, and hesitated.

"Are you embarrassed?" asked Lily, surprised.

At this, his cheeks turned a delicate shade of pink. "No. I mean, maybe." His hand migrated to his hair. "I ask because I realized on our uh, our Hogsmeade trip, how little I really know about you. I mean, I hadn't even known that you knew Snape before Hogwarts! I didn't know that you had a sister, or that your favorite color was red, or that you hated licorice wands. I wanted to know those things for so long, and I bet Snape knows all of them-" he trailed off.

It was Lily's turn to blush. "Oh."

"I can stop though," he said quickly. "I don't have to ask if it makes you uncomfortable."

She shook her head, cheeks burning hotter. "No, no, it's fine. I don't mind." They'd reached the Potions classroom, and hesitated outside. Lily could see Snape through the doorway, watching them.

"I do have another question," James said. His voice had lowered to a near whisper. Lily leaned closer.

For the first time, she noticed that he had little chips of gold in his irises, and that he smelled like pine and woodsmoke. "I uh, well, I was wondering if I could show you something. Tonight. It'd be a little like the Hogsmeade thing, you know, just for fun."

Lily's stomach cartwheeled. She mentally forced it to stop. She was doing this for the mission. "Yeah, that'd be fun."

"Great, meet me outside of the Fat Lady at nine tonight. Bring the cloak. And be hungry."

As they walked into the classroom, Snape glared at James. Lily took her usual spot beside him, and he tore his gaze from the back of Potter's messy haired head.

"Plan going well then?" he sneered.

"Quiet," she hissed.

Slughorn bustled in, winked at Lily, and clapped to get the class's attention. "New unit today! Those of you who want to be healers listen up, we're beginning our medicinal brewing." He turned to write the instructions on the blackboard.

An hour later, and Lily's hair was sticking to her forehead with sweat, but she'd produced a perfect pepper up potion. She scooped up a flask of the mint green liquid, and handed it in to Slughorn. He beamed at it. "Perfect as usual, Lily. Ten points to Gryffindor."

"My potion was at least as good as yours," complained Severus as they entered the hallway. "Why does he always give you points? You're not even in his house!"

Lily just smiled at him.

When they reached the stairs that led to the Charm's classroom, he touched her arm. "Just be careful with Potter, Lily. He may not have your best interests at heart."

"Thanks Sev," she said, allowing some sarcasm to creep into her voice.

He looked at her, his eyes black as obsidians and completely unreadable. "Bye Lils."

By 9 o'clock, Lily was thoroughly curious about where James was taking her. She waited outside the portrait of the Fat Lady, the invisibility cloak folded neatly over her arm.

"Hey," said a voice behind her, and Lily turned to see James. His cheeks were red from being whipped by the wind, and his hair had been blown into fantastic swirls. Mud caked the bottom of his robes.

"Quidditch practice?" she guessed.

He grinned at her. "Yep, and I'm starving." He pulled the invisibility cloak from her arms, and shook it out. With one expert flick, he draped it over them both. They both ignored the Fat Lady's gasp.

"You'll have to keep close to me," James whispered. Lily allowed him to step closer to her, until the bottoms of the cloak brushed the floor. Her heart beat unsteadily at how close he was, and another part of her-long ingrained from years of fighting with him-wanted to stamp her foot and yell at him for taking advantage of the situation.

The more mature bit won out, however, and they moved clumsily along the they finally reached their destination, James stopped so suddenly that Lily almost walked out from under the cloak. They stood in front of a floor length portrait of a bowl of fruit. James pulled the cloak off, and reached out to gently tickle the pear.

There was a moment's pause, and then the portrait swung inward. A myriad of wonderful smells wafted out. Lily caught a glimpse of a giant oven, gleaming sinks, and a row of fridges. Huge chains of garlic hung from the ceiling, alongside dried herbs and glistening meats. "The kitchen?" she asked James, puzzled.

A chorus of high-pitched voices greeted them. "Mr. Potter, Mr. Potter sir! We haves your things ready!" A house elf with particularly tufty ears bowed low to them, and led them to the back of the kitchens. A small round table, draped in a white tablecloth, had been set up by a large stone fireplace.

James grinned shyly at her.

"Your seats, sir and madam," said the house elf, pulling out each of their chairs.

"Thanks Tinker." James took his seat, and Lily sat across from him. She felt suddenly shy, looking at him over the perfectly set table with the stub of candle that had been lit in the middle of it. _Think of it like an auror_, she told herself. _Find out about him. Figure out his weaknesses, his strengths. His motives. _

"How was quidditch practice?" she asked, after an awkward pause.

He lit into the subject with enthusiasm, telling her about McKinnon's wonderful dive for the quaffle, and Hooch's spectacular 5 minute snatch of the snitch. "It's really the strongest team we've had as long as I've been here. It makes the flying so fun-you don't even have to worry that everyone will be doing their part. You just focus on the game, on your own flying abilities, and trust the others to take care of things-" he froze suddenly, looking at her. "Say, I've never seen you on a broom before."

Lily smiled ruefully. "That's true. I just…" she trailed off, unable to think of an excuse. Why had she never ridden? She wasn't afraid of heights and she loved the feeling of soaring through the air. A very small part of her admitted that it was because during her flying lessons First Year, she had been so abysmal that she hadn't even been able to get the broom to jump into her hand. She didn't like to be bad at things, and so she hadn't tried it again. Her cheeks flooded with color.

"What?" asked Potter. The firelight flickered in his glasses as he watched her.

"You know, honestly, it's because I was terrible at it my first year. I couldn't even get the damn thing off the ground." She expected him to laugh, but to his credit, he simply looked surprised.

"Those brooms are horrible though! You can't go marking your abilities on a broom that's been abused by centuries of students. I'll let you try mine!"

She smiled at his enthusiasm. Tinker stepped up to his elbow, and swept low to the ground. "Sir, Miss, your meal." He guided three steaming platters onto the table. "Happy eating!"

Lily realized suddenly how starved she was. James whisked the covers off of each of the platters. "We have Shepherd's pie," he said, gesturing to a perfectly browned pie in the center of the table, "spaghetti and meatballs, and homemade chocolate chip cookies!"

Lily laughed with delight. "All of my favorites!"

James beamed. "I wanted to give you a taste of home. I knew you were missing it and…" he shrugged.

Happiness rose in her like champagne bubbles. "James," was all she could get out. She shook her head, grinning like a loon.

He scooped heaping pile of spaghetti onto his plate. "You know you've been using my first name ever since the Hogsmeade trip?"

Lily paused mid-bite. "Really?" She frowned. Somehow she hadn't even noticed the switch. She felt slightly annoyed with herself-in her thoughts at least, he should still be Potter.

"I don't mind, of course," James said quickly. "It just has been a welcome change."

Lily forced herself to smile, and took a big bite of Shepherd's pie. She looked around at the kitchens. "This place is amazing. I've been here six years and never even wondered where the food got cooked. Or who cooked it."

"I was lucky enough to discover it my second year," James said. "Sirius had heard about all of these secret passages from his relatives, and so we set out to try and find them. We'd explore all night under the invisibility cloak, saying different passwords to statues, doing silly things to each painting. It was actually Peter who discovered the trick of tickling the pear." He shook his head. "Never would've expected it from him."

Lily couldn't help but grin. This sort of confession would've driven her up a wall last year, but now she half wished that she'd been a Marauder. It sounded a lot more fun than the piles of homework she'd buried herself under.

"What are you thinking?" he asked. There was still a slight wariness in his eyes.

"Just that it's amazing how two people can go to the same school and yet have radically different experiences. Yours sounds like it was fun."

"Have you ever done anything… off the beaten track?"

Lily thought about it for a moment. "Back in third year I used to cast disillusionment charms on myself while Madam Pince was closing up the library so that I could stay all night. And once in awhile when I was really stressed out I'd go to the Prefect's bathroom in the middle of the night to take a bath… Oh and me and Sev used to illegally brew potions in the Room of Requirement. But other than those things-"

"What did you brew?" asked James. His dimples made long lines down his cheeks as he tried not to smile. The effect was ridiculously handsome.

"We made veritaserum last year. This year we're working on felix felicis. Or we will anyway, once we have all the ingredients."

James whistled, long and low. "Those are really tricky. How do you have time to do all that?"

She laughed. "I wonder the same thing about you, with your quidditch practices and everything."

When their platters showed gleaming gold on the bottom, the house elves magicked them away. They escorted the two students out of the kitchen, bowing and squeaking thanks. Once the painting had closed behind them, James tossed the cloak over them, and they crept back up to the Gryffindor common room, Lily smiling the whole way.

She was still smiling as she pulled on a raggedy t-shirt for pajamas. Try as she might, she couldn't get the dumb grin off of her face.

_Tap, tap, tap_. Lily looked up, half expecting to see James's face in the window. Instead, a barn owl hovered outside, its full moon face peering in expectantly at her. She pulled open the window, shivering as a gust of crisp fall air rushed in.

It waited with an air of long-tried patience as she untied the letter with clumsy fingers. Once she'd undone it, the owl swished back out onto the dark grounds.

Lily unrolled the letter eagerly, recognizing Hagrid's scrawl.

_Lily, _

_Ollivander wrote again-needs his unicorn hair sooner than later. Want to come down two days from now to help? Round sunset would be best. Should be a full moon-good for light. Write back._

_Cheers,_

_Hagrid_

Lily jotted down a quick response on the back of his letter, saying that she couldn't wait, and tied it onto the owl's leg. As soon as it was attached, the owl swept out onto the dark grounds. She closed the window with relief, rubbing at the goosebumps that had popped up on her arms.

"What was that?" asked Marlene McKinnon, pulling the curtains around her bed back. Her thick brown hair was piled in a messy bun on her head. She smirked when she saw the quill in Lily's hand. "Writing love notes to Potter?"

Lily flushed. "No, Hagrid wants me to help out with some grounds work."

"Ah," said Marlene. She was still smirking.

"Really!" insisted Lily. "What would you know about me and Potter anyway?"

"Well, I know that he was distracted all practice. Kept dropping the quaffle. That's only happened once before, and that was in second year when you caught his eye during the match against Hufflepuff."

"Really?" Lily leaned forward on her bed. She knew she shouldn't be interested in hearing more, but she couldn't help it.

Marlene's smile grew. She looked like a cat who'd eaten a canary. "Yep. That boy loves you more than a niffler loves gold."

"Did he tell you about-about our plans?"

"He didn't want to. We cornered him after practice and made him 'fess up. I've never seen the boy so red before. Looked a bit like you now, actually."

Lily's blush deepened. "I can't help it, it's my complexion-"

"Sure it is," said Marlene easily. "Anyway, you be careful with his heart. Our game against Slytherin is coming up, and you'd best not do anything to compromise his playing."

"You Quidditch people are so ridiculous."

Marlene grinned at her. Then she withdrew into her bed.

The next morning at breakfast, Lily told Alice about her dinner with James and Hagrid's invitation.

"Did he tell you anything useful?" asked Alice. Her eyes were sharp on Lily's face.

"Er-not really. We talked about quidditch mostly."

"Hmm," said Alice noncommittally. She turned to her breakfast.

"What does that mean?"

"It just sounds to me like you forgot all about the mission," she said slowly. Lily could tell that she knew she was treading a very fine line.

"I didn't, there just wasn't a good opportunity," said Lily primly. She looked up and spotted Severus leaving the Great Hall. She scooped up her last bite of porridge and stood. "Alright, I'm off. I have to talk to Sev about potion ingredients."

"See you, Lily," said Alice. She sounded tired.

Lily caught Severus in the entrance hall, about to step onto one of the moving staircases. "Hey," he said. He looked pleased that she'd sought him out. "What's up?"

"We need unicorn hair for the potion don't we?" Lily was slightly out of breath from running after him.

"Yeah, we do-two hairs. Why?"

She explained how Hagrid had asked her to help him. "I'm going in a couple of days, and I'm sure Hagrid wouldn't mind if I kept a couple of hairs-Sev?" Severus was staring at her, his eyes intense on her face.

"Did you say two days?"

"...yeah?" asid Lily, puzzled.

"And you'll be out on the grounds, after dark?" he clarified.

"Yes, but I'll have Hagrid with me. There's nothing to worry about, Sev, I can take care of myself."

His face closed off. "Just be careful. It's a full moon then, and strange things happen during full moons. Not even Hagrid can protect you from some of them."

Unbidden, a chill crawled its way up her back. "I'll be perfectly safe," she insisted, pushing away the unease that his words had awoken. "I don't think we're going all the way into the forest, anyway. Just the borders."

Snape nodded. "Let me know if you see anything interesting, would you?"

"Sure," said Lily. She looked at him for a moment, trying to figure out what he'd meant, but his face was impossible to read.

Lily started as the staircase began to move under them. "Dung, I've got to go to the library!" She jumped off of it, ignored the small smattering of applause that broke out from some nearby Ravenclaws when she landed on her feet, and trotted off down the hall.

The afternoon of her appointment with Hagrid, Lily went back up to her dormitory after classes and pulled out all of her warmest clothes. With Hagrid, she was never sure how long she'd be out, and there had been a thick frost on the windows each night. Severus had made her nervous, but she was still more excited than anything. She loved animals of all sorts, and had been sad to give up Care of Magical Creatures for her other classes. The only reason she didn't have a pet was because her dad was allergic to cats, and Petunia refused to live in the same house as an owl. She didn't particularly want a toad or rat.

When the sun had almost been eclipsed by the forest, she headed out onto the grounds. The air was crisp, and the frosty grass crunched underfoot. She was glad for her hat and mittens. Hagrid was waiting for her outside of his hut.

"Alrigh' Lily?" he asked as they set off toward the forest.

As they walked Hagrid told her a bit about unicorns. "They're crepuscular, see. Prefer sunrise n' sunset. I 'spect it's the colors they like. In their nature to like gentle things."

"Alrigh," he said once they reached the edge of the forest. "I'll drive 'em to yeh. All yeh 'ave to do to make 'em come to yeh is smile, and think kind though's. That ough' to do the trick. Once they're close, slip this round their necks." He handed her a bundle of ropes. The fibers were silky against her fingertips. "Silk, see. So it don' rough em up any. They like their foreheads patted, soothes em. Alrigh?"

"Sounds good," said Lily, trying to infuse confidence she didn't feel into her voice.

"Grand," said Hagrid. She watched as his broad back was swallowed up by the forest. Lily looked around. From here she could see the Whomping Willow, and the broad, dark spread of the lake. She was glad that Hagrid hadn't insisted she follow him into the forest.

The sun had slipped behind the trees when Lily heard voices. She looked over to see the school nurse leading Remus toward the Whomping Willow. She expected them to stop a few good paces from it, as it was a notoriously violent tree, but instead the nurse simply prodded it with her cane and the tree's brutal branches froze. Lily watched with intensified curiosity now. They approached the tree, and then Remus disappeared into the base of it. The nurse turned around, and headed back up to the castle.

Lily was so distracted by what she'd seen that she forgot completely about the unicorns until something came crashing through the forest toward her. A glimmer of white shone through the trees, and then a full grown unicorn had cleared the brush. Lily did her best to think about kind things, like giving presents and hugging people. It wasn't hard to smile-the unicorn was so pretty that it seemed to fill her with warmth, like a patronus. She held out her hand to it, and the creatures delicately picked its way through the lawn toward her.

Lily fumbled with the rope, and then slipped it around its silky neck. She held out a hand, and the animal took deep snorts of her scent. Lily tentatively reached up toward its ears. Its ears were velvet soft, and the unicorn closed its eyes as she rubbed circles around them.

Those long, lanceate ears flicked backward as more crashing disturbed the silence of the sunset. "Grea' job, Lily!" cried Hagrid as he peered out of the woods. "Give 'er ears a good rub." He slipped out of the woods, and came carefully towards them. The unicorn stomped a foot as he neared, but stayed otherwise quiet. With a steady hand, Hagrid clipped off a thin strand of the unicorn's tail hair.

"Alrigh' release 'er," he said, backing off a good ways. Lily gave the unicorn's ears a last rub, swept a thumb along her smooth horn, and then released her. She slowly opened her eyes, looked around at them as though coming up from a trance, and bounded away into the woods.

"Be back in a mo', thou' I heard a second one in there," said Hagrid after he'd carefully folded the hair into a pouch around his neck. He melted into the trees with an ease that belied his size.

The grounds were darkening now, dusk falling over them like a blanket. Lily glanced back over at the Whomping Willow. Remus hadn't emerged, or if he had, she hadn't noticed. She wondered what was going on, why a Hogwarts employee would just ditch a student under a vicious tree. She wondered if maybe this was what Snape had gotten tangled up in. His face loomed up in her memory-pale, stricken, with dirty, scraped knees. He'd been terrified that night, scared in a way that she'd never seen before. And that had been after he'd talked to Dumbledore. Lily shuddered. She wished Hagrid would come back out of the trees.

The tree froze, the same way it had when Madam Wiggins had prodded it with her cane. Lily watched it carefully, her heart thudding in her chest, but no one appeared. She turned around to look back up at the castle. It was reassuringly large, close by. She reasoned that if she needed to run, she'd probably be able to outrun anything to the doors. Probably.

Behind the castle, a full moon had risen, its silvery white light pooling on the smooth stones of the towers and reflecting off of the lake. Hagrid was right, it did provide a lot of light.

Lily was still looking up at the castle when she heard a noise. She spun around, just in time to see something large and dark burst out from the base of the Whomping Willow. A moment later a second followed, and then a third. Then they stepped out of the shade of the tree, and she made out a giant stag, its gait playful, crowned head bowed. A big black dog raced in circles around it, biting at its heels, barking joyfully. When the third creature appeared in the moonlight, Lily's breath caught. It was a wolf, but even from this distance she could tell that there was something off about it. Its snout was too short, legs too long, back too hunched. A werewolf.


	7. The Owlery

**A/N: The plot thickens! Reviews, as always, help me to know what's good and what's bad. I've officially caught up with myself, so updates will likely be about once a week now. **

**Disclaimer: I'm not JK Rowling, and I don't own her creations!**

Lily's heart had begun to race with fear, and the speed of her thoughts seemed to match her pulse. Snape's warning flashed through her mind, and she vividly remembered his fear at her being out on the grounds during the full moon. He knew. Suddenly, Lily realized what Severus had met in the tunnel under the Whomping Willow. A werewolf. Lupin. Lupin must be a werewolf. It all made sense-his illness during every full moon, the fact that Voldemort was recruiting "his kind," Severus's comment about his nature being close to the Dark Arts. She crouched down in the grass, terrified of being seen.

The dog turned to jump away from the stag and pounced on the wolf-Lupin-instead. The werewolf snarled in response, batting at it with a massive paw. Lily stayed crouched even after they had disappeared into the woods. The trio made an odd group. They had looked friendly, playful even. She shivered. It was unnatural.

Unless-Unless they weren't really animals. It was insanity, almost impossible, but she couldn't see any other way. She remembered James's quip at breakfast weeks before that he'd been up all night helping a friend.

She was deep in thought when crackling from the woods made her jump. She stood poised, uncertain whether she should run or try to defend herself, when Hagrid burst out of the woods. "Scare yeh?" he asked, eyeing her face. "Can' blame yeh. Werewolves are out tonight, heard em howling in th' forest."

Lily nodded. Her face felt cold with fear. "Well, we 'ave 'nough unicorn hair to get by with," said Hagrid. "Don' want to take an' risks with the werewolves. Le's get yeh to the castle." Hagrid walked her back up to the castle. Lily had to take two steps for each of his, but she was grateful to get away from the forest. Having it at her back made her skin crawl.

When they reached the giant front doors, Hagrid paused. He fumbled with the pouch around his neck. "Thou' I might give you this, as a thanks fer helpin'." He pulled off a thin strand of unicorn hair from the larger bunch, and handed it to her. "Unicorn hair bracelets are mighty lucky."

Lily clutched the silvery hairs to her chest. "Thanks Hagrid," she said fervently.

"Nigh, Lily," he called as she slipped into the castle.

"What do you mean you think Dumbledore knows?" asked Alice, her face pale in the low light of their dormitory. The two girls were squeezed into her four poster bed, with a silencing charm cast on the curtains so that they wouldn't wake the others.

"Well Sev obviously told him everything. And he's told me that Dumbledore said he had to keep what he saw secret… So he must know."

Alice frowned. "I know Dumbledore is brilliant and all that, but I just don't see how anyone could trust a werewolf! It's dangerous! What if he had bit you?"

Lily shivered. She was still having trouble wrapping her head around the fact that the sweet, quiet, kind boy she had known for six years was a monster.

"And what about the other animals?" continued Alice.

"They weren't animals," said Lily.

Alice opened her mouth, aghast. "You mean-"

"Yeah, I think they're animagi. Potter, Black and Pettigrew at least. What are their stupid little nicknames? Moony, Padfoot, Prongs, and Wormtail? Makes sense, doesn't it. Moony because Lupin's a werewolf. Padfoot because Black is a dog. Potter is Prongs, the stag. And Pettigrew-I didn't see Pettigrew."

"A rat," stated Alice. "He was too small for you to see him. Rats have wormy looking tails. And Peter always has struck me as a bit of a rat."

"That makes sense." They were silent for a moment. Lily could feel the weight of the mystery unraveling, settling on her shoulders.

"What I can't see," said Alice suddenly. "Is how they managed to do it. Becoming an Animagi is supposed to be extremely difficult… and while I could see Potter managing it, it doesn't seem likely that Black or Pettigrew would be able to."

"I'm not sure," said Lily doubtfully. "Black is actually an extremely talented wizard. I've seen him cast a corporeal patronus without a second thought during our Defense Against the Dark Arts classes. He just doesn't try most of the time. But I see what you mean about Pettigrew. That sort of magic seems beyond him."

"Potter has a lot of secrets." Alice lay back, staring up at the canopy of her bed. "First the invisibility cloak, then his little werewolf adventures as an animagus. I wonder what else he's hiding."

"The invisibility cloak!" said Lily, excited. "That's how they got under the tree without me seeing! You're brilliant, Alice!"

Alice laughed, but Lily cut her off with a gasp. "You know why Potter wanted to have dinner last night?"

"Why?"

"To get the invisibility cloak back! It was all a ruse!"

Alice frowned. "You think he asked you to dinner just to get the cloak back?"

"Yes," said Lily, stubbornness creeping into her voice.

"Why wouldn't he just ask for it back? It'd be a lot less work."

"Cause then it would be obvious that he needed it for something!" exclaimed Lily, getting more excited as she thought it through. "He didn't want me to be suspicious, so instead he pretended like he wanted to have dinner so that he could just take it back afterwards!"

"I think that's a bit of a stretch." Alice leaned back on her palms, expression skeptical. "He asked you out because he likes you."

Lily shook her head. "What if it's all a ruse? What if he's just pretending that he still likes me to keep me from being suspicious!"

"I think you need to go to bed," said Alice. She leaned over and flipped the light off. "Night Lily."

Lily rolled her eyes, annoyed at the abrupt dismissal, and crawled into her own bed.

She spent the next week mulling over what she'd guessed, trying to decide what to do about it. It was difficult to meet Remus's eye without blushing scarlet, and Lily didn't want him to guess that she knew. She found herself getting up earlier and earlier to avoid the Marauders, and the only time James was able to find her to talk to her was during Transfiguration.

To fill up the time further, Lily and Severus had begun brewing their Felix Felicis in the Room of Requirement. It was as complicated and finicky as Slughorn had made it out to be, but she was glad for the challenge. The hours she spent stooped over her cauldron, carefully adjusting temperatures and ratios, were the only times she was able to escape from the weight of everything that was happening in the wizarding world.

She hadn't told Severus about what she'd discovered during her night helping Hagrid. She wasn't sure why, exactly, but she had the feeling that if he knew he'd try to stop her from getting any further involved. And while Lily wasn't sure what to do next, there was no way she was about to give up on the mystery.

Her suspicions furthered that Potter had simply used their last date as an excuse to get the cloak back when he didn't seek out another meeting. For some inexplicable reason, this frustrated her. She often caught herself watching him whenever he was in the room, and couldn't stop her thoughts from turning to what he was doing whenever he wasn't in sight. "It's for the mission," she told herself (and Alice, whenever she called Lily out for being obsessive).

In late November, a mass of dark clouds blanketed the grounds in snow. Hogwarts began to prepare itself for Christmas, with great wreaths of pine ringing the staircases, and the coats of armor dusted off and enchanted to sing.

"Get Christmas presents for your family yet?" Asked Severus one night as they plucked lacewing legs for the potion.

Lily frowned. "I haven't," she admitted. "But I was thinking I might take the rest of that unicorn hair and weave it into a circlet for Petunia to wear on her wedding day. I'm not sure she'd wear it but…"

"That's an awfully good present to waste on a crummy sister," said Severus, sneering. "Aren't you going to save any for yourself?"

Lily ignored the jab about Petunia-he was baiting her, and she wasn't about to bite. Instead, she pulled a tiny, silvery circlet from her robes. "I made myself a little bracelet. I've been trying to decide how to attach it…" She offered it to him.

He took it gently, twirling the silky, braided strands in his fingers. "I can bind it into a circle for you."

"That's what I was planning to do," Lily told him. "It's just hard to hold it on while simultaneously holding a wand."

"Here," he said, holding out a hand. She laid her arm across it. With gentle fingers, he wrapped the bracelet around her wrist and waved his wand. A blue spark ran along the surface of the bracelet. When Severus let go, the ends of the hairs had fused together.

Lily examined the bracelet, admiring the way it shone pearly-white against her skin. "It looks beautiful," said Sev quietly.

"Thanks." Lily smiled.

He caught her eye, and she stood suddenly, embarrassed. "Well, I think I'll write to my mum, see what she says about Petunia's circlet. See you tomorrow night?"

"Yep," Snape drawled. He turned back to the potion. "I'll just finish up here…"

She paused in the hallway. She wasn't particularly in the mood to write to her mum and dad, but as it had been awhile, she might as well be true to her word. She ducked into an empty classroom to scrawl out a message that described all the mundane bits of Hogwarts life without any of the mystery or fun, and then headed to the owlery to send it off.

She was halfway up the stairs when the sound of voices made her pause.

"I swear, Black," said a low, serious voice. "I can just see him drawing her into it all, and I won't stand for it."

"It's none of my business, and especially none of yours who the Dark Lord selects as a tool," said a deep, quiet voice.

"Maybe not, but remember this," there was a pause, and Lily heard a frightened intake of breath. Her own heart rate sped up in response to it. "I will kill him if he draws Voldemort's attention to her. I swear I will."

Something scuffed against the wooden floor. "You know," the boy spat, "you're just selfish. You pretend to be all scared for her, but you're going to get her killed just the same, and you don't want anyone else to stand in the way of your doing it."

There was a bang, a shout, and a tall, narrow boy burst through the owlery door. Regulus, Sirius's younger brother. He gave Lily an incredulous look, and then huffed off down the corridor. Lily waited a long moment before walking through the door. She needed to know, just needed to be sure.

There, a hand glued to his mess of hair, stood Potter. He jumped when she walked in the door.

"What'd you do to piss Black off?" she asked. She kept her voice light. For once, she didn't feel like blushing or giggling or yelling at him. She felt coldly angry, completely in control of every action. It sounded like a girl's life was on the line.

"Did he look angry?" asked Potter warily.

"Mutinous," said Lily. "We almost ran into each other on the stairs."

Potter's face relaxed, and she felt a small jolt of pride at successfully misleading him. "Let's just say he wasn't pleased with my point of view," he said, pulling his hand from his hair.

Lily forced a laugh. She turned to the school owls, and selected particularly bright eyed looking barn owl. After tying on her letter and giving it an owl treat, she watched it soar out the open window.

When she turned around, she found James watching her. He looked incredibly handsome, surrounded by straw and feathers and droppings. Looking at him, she felt even angrier. Angry that he wasn't what he seemed to be, that he disregarded everything and everyone in his path for his own gain.

"Who were you writing to?" asked Potter. He was standing, empty handed and still in the middle of the owlery.

"My family," Lily answered. "I needed to ask my mum about a Christmas present for Petunia. Who were you writing to?"

James looked sheepish. "I was sending in a Zonko's order form." His face twisted. "I don't… I don't have any family left to write to."

A plan began to form in her mind. Before she could really think it through, she spoke. "What are you doing for the winter holidays?"

For a moment he just stared at her, unspeaking. Then, as though rousing himself to awakeness, he shook his head. "Sorry. I've just been trying not to think about that."

"No, it's fine." She pushed away the small trickle of pity she felt for him. "I just was wondering if maybe you'd like to spend it with my family-you know, since…"

His whole face lit up. "You mean like coming home with you?"

Lily laughed, a real laugh. Even through her anger, his delight was catching. "Yeah, that would be part of it."

"I'd love to." He shook his head. "You really don't know how much it means to me…"

She shrugged. "It's no trouble. My mum's been asking about boys unsuccessfully for the past four years. She'll be delighted. Speaking of, I guess I ought to let her know." Lily rummaged in her bag for a quill and paper, and scrawled a quick note. "Follow the last owl I sent," she instructed a speedy looking horned owl. It hooted softly, and sped away.

James followed her out of the owlery. He was quieter than usual, but Lily was fine with silence. It gave her time to try and make sense of the last few minutes. She was beginning to think she'd gone slightly insane.

Alice agreed. "What do you mean your anger made you invite him? In what twisted way does that even make sense?" she huffed at Lily as they worked at the back of the herbology classroom the next day.

"There are multiple reasons it makes sense, thanks," said Lily icily (she hadn't admitted that she thought Alice might be right). "First off, it makes it so that he can't do anything bad during the whole of the holiday-he'll be under my nose the entire time. And that matters when it sounds like he's planning to get some girl in trouble-"

"Yeah, if that's what all of that meant-" cut in Alice, exasperated. "It sounded to me like he was trying to protect-"

"Second," said Lily raising her voice. "I'll be able to get him out of his comfort zone, make him trust me. The more he trusts me, the easier it'll be to discover what he's up to."

Alice rolled her eyes. "That's a weak argument and you know it."

Lily slammed down the poison pod she'd been peeling. "You know what?" she said, eyes flashing. "I'm sick of your doubt. I don't see you trying to make a difference. You spend all your time making puppy dog eyes at Frank. If you want to criticize the way I'm doing things, then get off your bloody bum and do them yourself."

Alice's mouth pinched into a thin line, and she squeezed her pod so tightly that it exploded into a green burst. They worked in stiff silence for the rest of the class, and when Professor Sprout dismissed them, Lily dashed out the door.

She was walking up to the castle, when an owl swooped down and fluttered near her head, an off-white envelope flapping beneath it. Lily held out her arm, and allowed the bird to settle while she untied the envelope.

_Lily Evans, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry_, was written in her mother's tidy handwriting on the front. She ran a finger under the seal to break it, and pulled out the letter.

_Lily,_

_We received your letter early this morning, and read it over breakfast-cookies again. Your dad has gone on a bit of a spree. First off, I believe that Petunia would love a unicorn circlet to wear on her wedding day. Do you remember Mr. Fluffy, her old unicorn stuffed animal? I think he'd approve too. Really though, it's a wonderful idea, and even if Petunia is uncertain at first, I'm sure once we explain how lucky and rare it is, she'll jump right on board. Dad wants me to tell you that he's proud of you, and that this confirms he did a wonderful job raising you. I told him he was lucky I did a wonderful job birthing you. _

_As to your second bit of news, we would be delighted to have one of your friends stay with us! (Your father keeps interrupting me. He says he is less than delighted and that boys are gross). We'll get the guest room all ready for him. What's his name?! What's he like? Are you dating? Won't his parents mind? Sorry, I know you hate questions. I suppose we'll know soon enough! _

_School has been good. That little boy named Billy I wrote to you about before seems bent on becoming a muggle version of Voldemort. Your dad's business has been doing well, and he'd like me to add that he never has to deal with the spawn of devils. _

_We miss you Lily love. The house feels empty without you.  
>We send lots of love,<em>

_Mom & Dad_

Lily tucked the letter away. Reading the letter had eased some of the tension from her argument with Alice. She smiled as she thought about her dad baking cookies each morning, even though Petunia was an avid calorie counter, and her mom usually stuck to cornflakes.

Christmas break was only three weeks away, and while Lily was looking forward to seeing her family, she had mixed feelings about her rash decision to invite Potter. Sure, it was for a good reason (or so she kept telling herself). However, as each day slid by, the enormity of having Potter in her home began to unfold. James Potter, the boy who had tormented her for six years, would see her house! He'd see where she'd grown up. He'd meet the people who had raised her, who had changed her diapers and made sure she didn't starve to death. He'd meet Petunia. What if he ruined everything that she'd worked so hard to fix?

The days seemed to fly by, helped along by the massive piles of work that her professors kept assigning. Her and Alice had come to a grudging truce, where they both avoided talking about Potter. Thankfully, that wasn't difficult to do, with the amounts of work they both had, they spent most of their time either griping about the unfairness of the Hogwarts professors, or trying to figure out how best to tackle their assignments.

A week away from break, Lily was sitting in an armchair by the fire with her Transfiguration notes covering her lap, when a first year climbed through the portrait hole and meekly approached her.

"A boy outside asked me to get you," he said. "He said he'd wait outside."

Lily frowned. "Okay, thanks." She piled all her notes into a messy bunch, and swept them onto the seat behind her.

Severus was waiting for her outside of the portrait hole.

"What's up, Sev?" she asked, leaning against the chilly castle wall.

"I heard that Potter is coming home with you for break," said Severus, his tone accusing. Guilt twisted in Lily's stomach. She'd avoided telling him over the past two weeks-it had been hard enough listening to Alice berate her. She didn't particularly feel like hearing it twice.

"Where'd you hear that?" She tried to keep her tone light.

"He and Pettigrew were talking about it in arithmancy. '_What should I wear, Peter? Do you think they'll like me? What if they don't?'_" He lifted his voice into a whiny, bratty tone.

"Sev, he lost his family. He doesn't have a home to go to."

"I thought you didn't care about him," he said accusingly. "I thought this was about fighting the Death Eaters."

"It is!" Lily insisted. "It is. You know what they say, keep your friends close and your enemies closer. You have to admit I'll be able to keep him out of trouble, and that by the end of it all I'll know him better than ever."

"I think it's a stupid idea." Snape's dark gaze drilled into her own. "I guess I'll be having Christmas eve dinner with my mum this year."

"No, Sev, you should still come. Potter knows that we're friends, and he wouldn't dare-"

Severus sneered. "You really think so? You think he'd put down his hatred of me for your family? For you? He doesn't care about you, Lily. He barely knows you!"

"Is there an issue here?" The voice was low, but it carried easily down the hallway. Lily swung around to find herself face to face with Potter. Lupin, Black and Pettigrew shifted uneasily behind him.

"No," said Lily quickly. "No, we just had a little disagreement. It's fine."

Snape snorted, gave her one last fleeting look, and swept off down the hallway. To her relief, Potter let him go.

"Is everything okay?" he asked in a gentler tone, stepping quickly toward Lily. Lily tried to smile, but it was shaky.

"Snape wasn't pleased that I invited you home for the holidays."

"Ah," said Potter. "I'm sorry about that."

Sirius looked disbelieving. As Lily climbed back into the portrait hole, she overheard him say, "That's it? You're not going to offer to curse off his slimy bum?"

James didn't respond. Lily could feel her appreciation for the mature model of Potter growing by the minute, even if it was only an act.

Alice looked up from her work to watch the boys troop up the stairs to their dormitory. She shook her head. "Well, Lily, at least you know how to make life interesting."

Lily grinned at her.


	8. Cold Kissed

**A/N: ...And the story rolls onward. Tell me what you love, what you hate, if I miss something obviously canon, if I bore you to tears, if you have a great story plot idea! I'll take all of it into deep consideration while writing. **

**Disclaimer: I own none of this. **

"What's your mum's first name again?" asked Potter, voice slightly strained.

"Rose."

"That ought-" his voice cut off as the carriage went over a particularly large bump. "That ought to be easy to remember."

He'd been looking slightly paler these past few days, and his hand was in his hair so much that she'd begun to wonder if it'd made a nest there. She would've felt bad about his nerves, but in reality she was glad that he was nervous. It didn't matter so much to her if he remembered her mum's first name, or if he forgot how to work a toaster. As long as he was polite to Petunia, and didn't say anything to upset her, Lily would be happy. And it seemed to Lily that the more nervous he was, the better behaved he'd be.

The carriage came to a shaky halt in front of the train station. Lily and James clambered out, pulling their magically lightened trunks behind them. "Ready?" asked Lily once they'd reached the platform. James nodded, and grasped her hand tightly in his own. Her insides did cartwheels, and some small part of her noted that his hand perfectly engulfed her own. Then she turned on her heel, and into the tight darkness of apparition.

They opened their eyes to bright sunlight reflected off of a layer of icy snow. Potter looked around with interest, and Lily saw her house through his eyes. It was a fairly normal suburban house, with two stories and cheerily painted shutters. It might have looked exactly like all of the other houses on the street, except for the large number of flowers growing in the windows and the humps of bushes and trees in the yard that the snow had covered.

As Lily went to open the door, James caught her eye. She realized that they were still holding hands. When she let go, her hand felt oddly cold, empty. To hide her confusion, she shouldered open the door and pulled her trunk inside. James followed her.

It smelled like freshly baked cookies and winter roses, beside her, James inhaled appreciatively. "Hello!" she called, leaning around a doorway.

"Lily!" Her mum came rushing out of the kitchen. She wrapped her daughter in a big hug, and then leaned back to take her in. "You're looking healthy, bit pale maybe. Getting out much?"

Lily laughed. "It's frigid on the grounds, mum."

"And you must be James." Rose Evans eyed him for a moment, and then pulled him in for a hug too.

"Nice to meet you, Mrs. Evans," he said fervently.

Over his shoulder, her mum gave her a thumbs up. Lily rolled her eyes.

Mr. Evans stuck his head around the corner. A streak of flour highlighted the front of his greying hair. "Lily flower!" He wiped his hands on the chili pepper apron that was draped around his neck.

She gave him a huge hug. "You're smelling more like cookies and less like flowers these days."

He grinned at her. "I felt I needed a new cologne. Eau de Chocolate Chip." He turned to James, and the grin faded some.

James held out his hand. "Nice to meet you, Mr. Evans." They shook hands, and then a small smile twisted James' lips. "You do smell like cookies."

Mr. Evans's face softened, and he smiled back at James. "One cookie a day keeps the dentist away!"

Lily's mum rested a hand on his arm. "I'm not sure it works that way, hon."

"Where's Petunia?" asked Lily.

Her mum's face tightened. "Out with Vernon."

Her dad hung his head. "It's my fault really, I'd forgotten you could apparate home and told her you'd be in right before dinner. I can call her if you'd like -"

"No, that's fine. I'll get plenty of time with her this break." Lily tried to keep the disappointment off of her face. "Should I show James his room?"

"Of course! The guest room is all made up for you," she smiled at him, and he grinned back. "Oh - Harry, honey - did you leave the oven on?"

Her parents bustled into the kitchen, where a faint smell of burning seemed to have joined the cookies. Lily looked up at James. "Well, I'll show you up."

He followed her upstairs, pausing to examine the old school photos her parents had hung on the walls. "You haven't changed much," he remarked, gently wiping dust off of a picture of her in first grade. "Well, except for maybe the height."

"Are you saying I look like a seven year old?"

James's hand flew to his hair. "No, I just mean - I guess I just mean that you were a cute little kid. Did you ever go through an awkward stage?"

Lily shrugged. "I always felt like red hair and green eyes put me in a perpetual awkward phase. I mean, I'm Christmas themed all year long."

James laughed. "I never saw it like that."

Lily didn't stop to ask how he saw it. Instead she hurried up the rest of the stairs. She gave him a quick tour as they went, pointing out the bathroom, her bedroom, and finally, the little guest room where he'd be staying. Lily opened the door for him wide enough to see that her mom had laid out a thick red quilt on his bed, and then went off to deposit her trunk in her own room. She had sunk onto her bed, and was inhaling the familiar smell of her sheets, when a quiet knock made her sit up.

James was standing awkwardly in the hallway. "You can come in," she said with little attempt to hide the resignation in her voice. She watched him as he soaked her room in, and was glad that her muggle posters were gone from the walls.

"Is that quilt handmade?" he asked, fingering the fringe of the quilt draped over her bed.

Lily touched it gently. "My grandmother made it for me when I was born."

"It's beautiful." His eyes were steady on her face.

Lily broke his gaze before she could blush, and looked around her room. There were bits of her in here, pieces of her childhood. The quilt, her unicorn figurines, the flowery old journal she'd written in as a kid. Before Hogwarts, this had been the room where she'd lain and dreamt of adventures and magic and all of the things that were too good to be real.

Maybe that was why she'd felt disconnected from her room ever since she'd received her letter. She no longer needed to dream.

James knelt in front of her bookshelf, pulled a novel down and flipped through it. "What's a pianoforte?"

Lily leaned forward to look at the book. _Pride and Prejudice_. "It's an instrument. You press different keys to make music."

James hummed low, and then put the book back on the shelf. "I like the lilies," he said with a grin, and stood up to admire the vase of lilies her dad had stuck on her bedside table.

"Thanks," she said, unable to decide if he was teasing her or not. "It's a tradition. You know, since my dad's a florist. Everytime I come home for break, he puts lilies in my room. Petunia gets petunias."

"I like it," he said. He brushed a gentle finger against one of the flowers. He was quiet for a long moment, head bowed over the bouquet. When he looked up, his eyes were sad. "Should we go downstairs?"

Lily hopped up from her bed and led him back downstairs. After a quick tour, they joined her parents in the kitchen.

"You have a beautiful home," James told her parents politely.

Mrs. Evans beamed at him, and shot a huge squirt of soap into the bowl she'd been washing. Bubbles began to fill the sink. "We recently had it redecorated. Lily's father was responsible for the original decorating, and it was a little -"

"Eccentric," said Lily. The bubbles were almost overflowing onto the counter now. She _evanesco_'ed them with a quick wave of her wand.

"Hey now." Her dad turned around to glare at them through bright green eyes, a tray of steaming hot cookies clutched in two oven mitts. "They're just fussy because the main theme was flowers."

"The main theme of your life has been flowers," said Mrs. Evans. "I've always suspected that you married me just because of my name."

Mr. Evans chuckled as he scraped the cookies onto a serving plate. "That was the initial attraction."

James's laugh was low, attractive. He'd settled himself on the stool next to her, and was watching her parents banter with a certain light in his eyes. Lily wasn't sure she liked that look. However, when he hadn't said anything embarrassing through a lunch of cookies and turkey sandwiches, she began to relax.

In fact, rather than embarrass her, so far he'd done the opposite. Within an hour he'd managed to completely charm both her mum and dad, entertaining them with stories about Lily at Hogwarts-that were always sweet and slightly funny, but not enough to make her blush-and explaining how things like brooms and moving pictures worked.

After a lapse in the conversation, her mum turned to her. "Lily, would you and James mind walking in to town to pick up groceries for dinner tonight? How does eggplant parmesan sound?"

"Sounds good to me, I can show James the town."

"Wonderful." Mrs. Evans followed them to the door. Under the guise of handing Lily the shopping bags and some money, she whispered, "He's a keeper."

"Yeah, yeah," mumbled Lily, embarrassed. "C'mon James."

They walked down the road side by side. The area was quiet because of the holidays, and almost no cars were on the road. The park loomed up ahead, its thick bushel of trees blocking the horizon from view. Lily pointed it out. "That's where I first learned I was a wizard."

James craned his neck to look down the path.

When they passed the Snape's house, however, Lily kept her mouth closed. The tattered window shades were drawn, and no cheery holiday lights shone on the porch. The sight of it made her sad.

"Would you mind if Severus came to dinner on Christmas Eve?" she asked once they'd turned the corner.

James looked up, surprised. "That's not for me to decide," he said uncertainly. The hand closest to her took a dive into his hair.

"No, I know. I guess I more meant to ask if you'd be nice to him."

"Of course." He looked down at her, his expression slightly horrified. "I'm your guest, Lily. It's not my place to decide who comes to dinner, and I wouldn't ever be rude to someone you wanted to invite."

Lily smiled. "Thanks. I might try to invite him… I mentioned it before and he-"

James winced. "Yeah, I think I caught the tail end of that."

"I'm sorry about that. I wouldn't normally push it, but his mum's awful, and they don't have much money for nice things like holiday dinners. He comes to ours each year."

A strange expression twisted James's face. "Where's his dad?"

"He was a muggle. Ran off on them." Lily watched him, curious about what was going on in his head. When he didn't say anything more, she stopped walking. "What are you thinking right now?"

James looked up, startled. "Why?"

"You look, I don't know, worried or something."

He turned to her, resignation written across his features. "I just hadn't realized. I never thought about where he came from, or what his family was like. I was so lucky with my parents that I never thought to wonder how people who didn't have a great family felt. It wasn't until my parents died that-" he cut off, shook his head.

Lily felt something inside herself soften toward him. Her head was weirdly light, as though oxygen wasn't getting to their brain. He was so incredibly handsome, with his hazel eyes scrunched into sickle moons, the broadness of his chest, the easy way he carried himself. They continued their walk, Lily squinting her eyes against the bright, sharp white of sun on snow, and thinking. By the time they reached the supermarket, she had come to a realization.

She had a crush on him. This side of him. She loved how thoughtful, how gentle he was. How he noticed little things about her. How he was charming without coming off as fake.

Admitting it to herself hurt. She could never have this James. He was an act, a mirage. A fake. He wasn't real. Lily shook her head, smiling at her own folly in falling for it.

"What are you smiling about?" James asked, tilting his head to look down at her.

For once, Lily decided to go with honesty. Partial honesty. "I just like you."

He grinned down at her, and carefully, purposefully, took her hand. Her heart flopped like a fish on land.

He held it the entire time they shopped. They both grabbed items with their free hands, and dunked them into the shopping trolley. In no time, the trolley was full, and Lily steered them toward the cashier. James was fascinated by the cashbox, and insisted on Lily giving him the money so that he could try using muggle money. The teller watched them suspiciously as Lily explained how many pounds he owed.

On the way home, James reclaimed her hand, and they each took a grocery bag with their free hands. A fierce war was waging in Lily's head; she was torn between how pleasant it was holding his hand, and how much more it would hurt when things ended if she let herself pretend.

Mrs. Evans met them at the door, and helped them unload their bags. She eyed their clasped hands speculatively. Lily immediately let go, her neck warming with embarrassment.

To fill up their afternoon, they helped Mr. Evans fry and batter the eggplant. He entertained them with stories about his clients as they worked, and the ridiculous requests he sometimes received for plants. In turn, James told him about the Hogwarts professors. Her dad was especially interested in Slughorn. "He really calls it the Slug Club? And you go to these things?!" he demanded of Lily.

"It's a good opportunity for networking," she explained. "Plus, he has a good heart."

James snorted. "Lily's just his favorite student."

Mr. Evans shuddered. "I hate slugs. They wreck flowers like it's their job."

"Not lillies though," said Lily with a smirk. "Garden slugs don't swim."

Her dad frowned. "I guess not."

James had just popped the eggplant in the oven when the front door opened. A frigid gust of wind rolled through the house as Petunia and Vernon took their time wiping down their shoes, and then tromped into the foyer.

Lily's mum flew down the stairs. "Petunia, Vernon, I'd like you to meet James Potter, Lily's… friend." Lily rolled her eyes at the suggestive pause.

James hurried forward. "Nice to meet you," he said, and shook both of their hands. Lily found herself watching Petunia carefully - for some bizarre reason, she felt the need for her sister to approve of James.

Once the introductions had finished, Lily hurried forward to give her sister a hug. Then, grimacing inwardly, she hugged Vernon too. The smell of cologne flooded her nose, and it was hard to avoid the belly that already spilled over his belt.

Dinner was stiff at best. Lily's mum tried to keep up a steady stream of chatter, however Lily was feeling unusually shy, and Petunia didn't seem inclined to contribute. Vernon, on the other hand, was happy to offer his opinions. They had just finished the salad and were starting on the eggplant, when Vernon brought up the subject of politics.

"Does your kind even have a government?" He had asked James. He was eyeing him like a bull might look at a red flag.

"Sure we do. We have the Ministry of Magic, and head of that is the Minister. Then there's the Wizengamot, which is the justice system."

Vernon hummed doubtfully. "Effective is it?"

James shrugged. "As any government. I'm sure Petunia has told you about the rise of Voldemort - their handling of him hasn't been the most effective. But other things work quite well."

"Let me tell you - Potter, is it? - if a mad man began ravaging our citizens, you can bet the police would have him behind bars in no time."

Lily cut in. She could sense tension rising. "We have people who do similar work to the police. They're called aurors, and they're highly trained. It's just when you add magic into the mix that things get a bit more complication."

"Highly trained." Vernon snorted doubtfully. "From what Petunia tells me, you magic folk spend all your time pulling rats out of things to scare innocent people. I find it hard to believe that any of your kind could begin to do work like our police-"

James stood, his ears flaming red. "Excuse me," he said to Lily's parents and stalked out the front door.

Lily rounded on Vernon. "Maybe you should actually know what you're talking about before you begin attacking people! James's parents got killed last summer during work as aurors." She stood too, and shot him a long glare. "You disgust me." Then she hurried after James, leaving silence in her wake.

Before she slipped out the door, she caught a glimpse of Petunia's white, livid face.

She found James in the backyard, sitting on the bench swing her father had affixed to the giant oak that towered over their house. She sat down beside him, close enough that she could feel warmth flooding from his body, but too far to touch.

"Sorry about that," he said. "I just, I was going to explode and I didn't want to do that to you."

"Don't worry about it. I should've warned you that Vernon is a royal arse."

"What'd they say when I left?" He rocked the swing so that both their feet skimmed the icy grass.

"Nothing. I sort of… yelled a bit… at Vernon…" She looked up at the sky, trying to fight away the sense of shame that had welled within her. Vernon deserved what she'd said. The only thing she regretted was how angry Petunia would be with her.

An infectious grin spread across James's face. "Really? For me?"

Lily sighed. "Yep. I never thought I'd see the day."

They rocked some more, James grinning quietly to himself beside her. "I'm really glad this all happened, you know," he said finally. His words were loud in the winter night, everything too frozen to absorb them. He moved closer to her on the bench, so that the warmth of his leg pressed against her own.

Lily felt a small thrill in her stomach, but her head was at war. This wasn't the real James, she repeated to herself over and over again. This James was fake, was using her. An ache opened up inside of her. She wanted him so badly, wanted him to be real.

She turned to him, and he met her eyes boldly. "I adore you," he whispered, and her whole body reacted, as though he'd lit her on fire. Then he leaned forward, and kissed her.


End file.
